


The Teacher Lounge Diaries

by alphvjensen



Category: Supernatural, Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Teachers, M/M, Mutual Pining, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-08 15:51:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 54,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15246675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alphvjensen/pseuds/alphvjensen
Summary: Jared is the new first year teacher at Northside High School. He’s excited about starting his new job, his new life. Years of schooling finally paid off to do the one thing he loves to do - teach. The first day of school is already nerve-racking enough but when Jared literally runs into the incredibly charming and equally as stunning Mythology and Folklore teacher, Jensen Ackles, the nerves only increase tenfold. The friendship that formed afterwards was easy but then things get more complicated when Jared starts to develop all the wrong kind of feelings for his co-worker. Jared never thought that he would have to relive all the feelings of a high school crush but when the crush starts to turn into something more, Jared finds himself just as lost as the kids that he teaches.It took years of schooling for Jared to get this job and then just one night for Jensen to mess up every single one of Jared’s carefully laid plans.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Wow. So here we go. This started as an idea all the way back years ago after watching cheesy Hallmark Christmas movies and all I wanted a cute, cheesy teacher!au between the boys. After many false starts, here it finally is, finished and ready for your consumption.
> 
> None of this would have been possible if it weren't for the wonderful support from the SPN writing group. I can't thank y'all enough for putting up with my constant questions and constant nagging and ranting about anything and everything under the sun. And thank y'all so so much for the final push these past few days. It kicked my ass in gear and it got this thing finished and completed. Y'all are so fucking amazing and I can't express how much y'all mean to me.
> 
> And then the most important thing of this whole fic, the absolutely wonderful art that the wonderful [txdora](http://txdora.tumblr.com) made to accompany this fic. It was everything and more than I could ever imagine and I just love it to death. Thank you so much!! You are truly amazing.
> 
>  
> 
> **  
> **  
> [AO3 Art Masterpost](https://tx-devilorangel.livejournal.com)  
>   
>  **  
> **  
> [LJ Art Masterpost](https://tx-devilorangel.livejournal.com)  
>   
> 
> Disclaimer: Just pretend that Tony Romo is still the quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys and that Dak Prescott hasn’t even been a thought on the radar and the Cowboys still suck.
> 
> Also disclaimer: This is your cheesy Hallmark movie made and written out staring these two wonderful fools. And as every good Hallmark movie possess the unrequited love, the pining, the miscommunication, the wonderful angst, the all dying declarations and of course, your happy ending. It is every bit as cheesy and infuriating as a true Hallmark movie. Please enjoy.
> 
> Another disclaimer: There was a small portion of the first chapter that had been posted before as an unfinished, half idea. It wasn't fully thought through and written. It was just a little teaser, something that I just posted on a whim, not thinking about what I was doing. And then that little teaser sat unfinished for about a year, just waiting to have something done with it. When I saw that I could still sign up for this challenge and being that I had a half finished idea that I really love, I thought that I would actually do something with it. The teaser was going nowhere but then I took it and started playing with it and actually made something out of it. So if you get a sense of deja vu while you read this first chapter, it's probably because you read the teaser ages ago but trust me, it is so much better now. It is polished and a complete thought.

_“The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray."_

 

Jared straightened his shirt for the third time that morning, biting the inside of his lip as he examined himself in the mirror, turning ever so slightly to see the whole outfit. There were two other shirts laid out on his bed that he’s already tried on and with the way that it’s looking, the one that he’s currently wearing is going to end up in that pile.

His heart continuously started to beat faster and faster the more he thought about leaving the comfort of his bedroom and start the first day of his brand new job.

They are going to be high schoolers. He kept repeating to himself. You are the teacher. They are going to be eighteen at the oldest. You’re twenty-seven, Jared. Almost ten years older than them. You’re going to be fine. You’re the one in charge and they were going to respect you. It’s gonna be alright.

At least, that’s what he kept telling himself, repeating it over and over in his head until he actually started to believe it.

He was once a kid in high school and he still remembered those first days of school. They were always hell for him. He never knew who was going to be in his classes or who his teachers would be. He didn’t have a ton of friends in high school which meant that most of the time he didn’t share any classes with any of them.

And unfortunately, as he was coming to find out, adulthood wasn’t much different.

The butterflies that were swarming around in his stomach didn’t cease to exist and they only seemed to grow the more he thought about what the day had in store for him. He already knew all the names of the kids that would be in his classes. The school administration had handed out the class rosters during the summer meetings and that’s where he met several of the teachers that taught at the school, as well as those that would be working in the english department with him. Still, he the thought that the kind smiles that his co-workers sent him way was only out of obligation and not because they liked the ideas that he brought to the table.

He never thought about it as a teenager but teachers apparently can get first day of school jitters too.

Finally deciding that he was never going to be a hundred percent pleased with what he was wearing, he settled on the blue button down that he currently had on and pulled his jacket out of the closet. For a moment, as he was shoving everything that he needed for the day into his bag, he had yet another flashback to his first day of high school with his unruly hair that never stayed in place and the slightly too big polo shirt and khaki pants that his mother forced him to wear. He didn’t look like that dorky, lanky teenager now but he still felt like it. A fish out of water just barely able to survive.

School didn’t start for another hour and a half but Jared wanted to get there early and start preparing himself for what would seem to be the longest day in his life. There were photocopies that needed to be made, last minute forms that needed to be filled out and he knew that once the school day started, he wouldn’t have time to breathe, much less doing everything else that needed to be taken care of.

His mind was reeling with the thoughts of what was to come as he pulled up to the teacher lot and parked his car, his mind preoccupied with everything. He was rummaging through his messenger bag, head elsewhere that he didn’t see the man in front of him.

One second he was searching through his bag looking for his teacher ID and then the next thing he knew, he collided with something, his feet slipping out from underneath him. There was a moment of panic and then he was bracing himself for the impact of hitting the concrete except it never came. Instead a pair of hands wrapped around his wrist and pulled him back up to his feet, making sure that he didn’t fall.

A startled gasp escaped Jared’s mouth.

After a second, Jared looked up at the man that he had accidentally run into and who had kept him from falling hard on his ass and for the second time that day in the matter of a minute, his breath got caught in his throat. He actually had to remind himself to breathe because he could easily find himself caught in this strangers hands, taking in his features and not breathe.

Piercing green eyes scanned over Jared’s body as they searched for any obvious signs of harm. The freckles that were expertly painted on his face seemed to jump out in the morning glow of the rising sun.

Hell, Jared half expected some cheesy, romance song to start playing somewhere in the background as he and this stranger stared at each other. I mean, it was starting to turn into one of those romance movies that middle aged women watch at night to fantasize some perfect love. This shit right here was the stuff that movies were made of.

Someone runs into the handsome devil, they nearly fall, he catches them, after some long, meaningful staring, the two of them started to fall in love and then it would be all unicorns and rainbows after that.

However, this wasn’t some movie that was playing on the Hallmark Channel. This was real life and it was happening to Jared and with each passing second, he could feel blush rising to his cheeks at his own clumsiness.

The stranger pulled Jared backup to a fully standing position after he concluded that there wasn’t any obvious harm to Jared.

Even as he smiled, Jared couldn’t form a complete sentence. The words wouldn’t come even though he was well versed in the english language. He had several degrees to prove it. But those words weren’t coming and it had everything to do with the way that the stranger was staring at him.

“I can’t see any physical harm on you but being that you haven’t uttered a single sound for the last minute, I do hope that I didn’t knock out your voice box.” He said with a voice that made Jared go weak in the knees for just a moment, as cliche that sounds and it only made Jared blush harder.

“Oh… um… I…” He cleared his throat, taking a step back as he tried to get the fog to clear from his head. “No, I’m fine. Thank you for catching me. I didn’t mean to run into you. I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going and I was trying to find my ID to get into the building and…” He was rambling he knew it but he couldn’t help himself.

“Hey, I get it. First day jitters, right?”

A light chuckle fell from Jared’s lips. “You have no idea.”

Another smile pulled at the corner of his lips. “You know, as the naive high schooler that I was, I never thought that teachers got nervous about the first day of school. Hell, even I didn’t get nervous about the first day of school. It was just learning with different people, ya know. But now…” He chuckled. “Guess I’m making up for lost experiences.” His green eyes seemed to shine even brighter.

“Yeah…” Jared scoffed. “I know.”

“I’m Jensen by the way.” The stranger said, sticking out his hand for Jared to shake and Jared took his hand in his.

“Jared.” He replied, pulling his bag further up his shoulder once he let go of Jensen’s hand.

“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Jared, even if you did try to knock me over.” Then he glanced at Jared’s bag and then down at the watch on his wrist. “So Jared, do you want me to escort you to your classroom?”

“What? You think that this first year teacher can’t find his way around the building? I was here for all the training, you know.” Jared inquired playfully.

“Oh no.” Jensen back tracked with a smile. “I think that you’re fully capable of it but I want to make sure that you don’t pass out due to a concussion. I know running into something as solid as me must have hurt and I can’t with a clear conscious let you go on your merry way and have you fall out somewhere. The moment these school doors open, you’ll be flattened in no time and that would be a damn shame.”

Jared’s mind was reeling. Was Jensen flirting with him? He never was good at picking up whether someone was or not, even back in high school. But like, why would Jensen even try to flirt with him? He was a blubbering, clumsy, awkward english teacher and Jensen was… he was everything but that. What it was, Jensen was just being nice, making jokes, trying to lighten the mood.

“Oh, I guess so.” Jared finally said. “It is your civic duty to make sure that I’m alright after you were the one that knocked me over.”

Jensen broke out with a laugh that had his whole body shaking. “You know, just a few minutes ago you were the one that was apologizing for running into me. What’s the truth, Jared?”

Jared furrowed his brow for just a second like he was thinking before he said anything. “Isn’t one of the symptoms of having a concussion is short-term memory loss?”

Jensen laughed again and in that moment, Jared vowed that he would try to make Jensen laugh as much as possible. “Then I suggest you telling me your room number so I can make sure that you get there safely without running into anyone else. We don’t want you forgetting your room number and then wandering around this school aimlessly.”

The nerves that Jared had been feeling about the first day of school and starting this new job seemed to disappear completely as he fell into step with Jensen. Jensen started talking, telling all the tricks and tips of the school. He told Jared the best staircases to use, the best teacher lounge to use. When you should and shouldn’t let kids eat in your classroom. It was everything that wasn’t covered in the summer meetings but all of the important stuff.

Jared also learned that it was Jensen’s fourth year teaching at Northside High School. He started out as a history teacher but then was offered the job of a Mythology and Folklore teacher that he snatched up as soon as it was offered. That and those first day of school nerves don’t disappear the longer you do the job. If anything, they seem to get worse because you start learning about the kids that might end up in your class through other teachers.

Before Jared realized it, he was standing in front of his classroom, his name plastered on the wooden door and he couldn’t deny the sadness that he felt when he realized that he was going to have to end this conversation with Jensen.

He was currently talking about school lunches and how they progressively gotten worse through the years. He told Jared about about the high school that he went too and how every Friday they would serve a freshly baked slice of pie to go along with the meal. He said that the little old lunch lady there was named Ms. Betty and how he learned to sweet talk her into giving him another slice of pie. The pecan was his favorite and Ms. Betty always made sure that Jensen got his slice.

Jared made a mental note to find this Ms. Betty and beg, borrow, steal or do whatever he had to do to get that pecan pie recipe just so that he could make Jensen a fresh pie. He barely knew the guy but already he wanted to do nothing more than to see him laughing and smiling all the time.

Jensen wished Jared luck on his first day of school and with that, turned in search of his own classroom. Jared couldn’t help but watch as he walked down the hall and out of sight.

Turning to face his classroom, Jared sighed.

Since he was the new teacher here, he was the low man on the totem pole meaning that he got the worst classroom in the entire school. The carpet that lined the floor was in desperate need of a cleaning. The student desks that were in messy rows looked like they were going to fall apart at any moment. The terrible paint color on the walls sucked all the life out of the room.

He had planned to work in his classroom over the summer, give it the make over over that it needed but the principal of the school had required him to attend all these different meetings. Some of them were through the school where he was supposed to get the layout of the building and some of them were from the district where he learned how to “be the best teacher that he could possibly be.”

In all reality, the meetings taught him nothing. Most of the meetings focused more one math and science and how to get students to take those classes and when he was in meetings that had to deal with english, they were mainly talking about how to help struggling kids, the ones that were placed in remedial classes.

He taught senior AP Literature which meant that the student has to want to take the class and be recommended by their previous english teacher. He wasn’t going to have a lot of kids in his class that couldn’t read and needed extra learning assistance.

So taking a look at those dull walls, he got the feeling that he would be spending the next couple of weekends up at school, remodeling his room that was going to quickly become his second home.

There honestly wasn’t enough time in the morning for him to get everything done that he needed to get done. He quickly ran down to the copy room, trying to avoid the awkward small talk with fellow teachers as he made copies of his syllabus. He knew that he would be finding them in the trash can for the next couple of days but he was required to make one.

He got back to his classroom and realized that he had left the pencils and paper that he bought for his students in his car and he ran out to get them. Then, as if he wasn’t doing anything, the principal called him up to his office to talk to him about first day of school procedures.

By the time that he got back to his classroom and settled down in his chair to take a breath, he needed a big pot of coffee or a good long nap and neither one of those things were going to happen.

The hallways soon filled with the noisy chatter of teenagers that were talking about all of their adventures that took place over the summer break and how they were already so tired and looking forward to the weekend.

Jared was seated at his desk putting together the last minute packets that he was going to hand out as the early students came in and picked the seats that they liked. Jared had decided early on that he wasn’t going to be that teacher that assigned seats to his students like they were in kindergarten. They were practically adults, they could pick their own seats.

He was fidgeting with something as he responded to yet another email that was sent to his school email when a knock at his open door pulled him out of his thoughts.

Why the hell is there anyone knocking at my door? Jared thought to himself. Just come in and take a seat. Anywhere.

Nonetheless, he still looked up, a little annoyed and was surprised to see Jensen standing in the threshold of the door with a cup of coffee in his hand waiting for permission to enter the classroom. Jared quickly stopped typing and jumped up from his seat to meet Jensen at the door to meet him.

“Jensen, what are you doing here?” Jared asked. Even though he say him just over an hour ago, it felt like ages.

He just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “I kept seeing you run past my room all morning and I thought that you looked like you could use a good, strong cup of coffee. All of these miniature demons that you are about to teach are going to suck the energy out of you.” He explained, offering Jared the cup. “Um… Hopefully I made it right.” He added and Jared wasn’t sure if it was because of the lighting or not but it looked like Jensen was blushing just ever so slightly.

Would it be pathetic to say that Jared was already starting to develop some very unprofessional feelings for this man?

“I’m sure it’s perfect.” Jared said with a reassuring smile as he took the cup of coffee. He took a sip and welcomed the warm into his bones, grateful for the caffeine. Then all of the sudden Jensen took a step closer to him, suddenly right up next to him, way to close to be considered co-workers and Jared’s eyes widened in shock. It took Jared’s brain an embarrassingly long time to process why Jensen stepped so close and it was all so that a student could walk into the classroom. But even as they entered, Jensen didn’t step back, seeming content right where he was.

And god, he smelled so good. Something that Jared wasn’t sure that he could name and he didn’t even know it was possible to smell that good.

“Don’t you… don’t you have a class to teach in a few minutes?” Jared asked, trying to keep his voice steady. His heart was pounding through his chest and with how close Jensen was, he was sure that he could hear it.

“They’re seniors.” He said simply. “You honestly expect them to show up on time to their first class on the first day of school?”

Jared looked down at his feet, trying to hide the redding of his cheeks. “Well, I did.”

Jensen’s chuckle brought Jared’s gaze back up to meet his. “Of course you were one of those students.”

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh nothing.” Jensen said with another one of those irritating smiles and he looked like he was about to say something else but out of nowhere, a group of rowdy teenagers passed by the room, yelling and hollering, pushing at each other. Both he and Jensen groaned in unison. It was too early to deal with screaming kids. “I wonder how many kids I’m going to have to kill this year.”

“Well, as someone who has read a lot through my lifetime, I’m sure that I could come up with some creative ways to dispose of the bodies.” Jared played along knowing full well that in the matter of minutes he was going to be feeling the same way.

“I would be mighty gracious for it. I get the feeling that the FBI are now growing highly suspicious of my weekly trips to the dump with human sized bundles wrapped in my car.”

God, he was insanely attractive, he smelled amazing, was too nice and he was funny. Yeah this was very quickly starting to turn into a Hallmark movie. All that was missing was that smartass kid in the back of the classroom asking when they were going to kiss.

Luckily that question never came and Jared was saved from the embarrassment of making a fool of himself. However now he was frantically trying to think of something else to say to keep the conversation going because he didn’t want Jensen to leave but the tardy bell beat him to the punch. Jensen smiled once more and then excused himself to return back to his room.

Jared noticed, as he turned back to face his class with the warmth of the coffee seeping into his hand, that almost all of the girls in the class were staring after Jensen with a dreamy look on their face and Jared didn’t blame them.

That man was basically a siren. With just the sound of his voice, Jared became putty in his hands.

And the thing was, Jared wasn’t even sure if Jensen was into guys and here he was with a hopeless crush on the guy. But the thoughts of Jensen was quickly replaced as he had to learn the names of twenty-one new students. The group of kids that he got seemed pretty good. They were quiet but attentive and they listened to Jared, jotting down important dates and the names of books that they would be reading for the year.

First block came and went and Jared was grateful for the coffee that Jensen had brought. Even though the kids were good and he knew that he was going to have a good time teaching them, he was exhausted by the time first period was over. Then the bell rang for second period and he had to do it all over again.

His second class of the day had more personality than his first class. It might have been from the fact that everyone had woken up a little more from first period, but everyone seemed to be more giggly and responsive. Several of the kids held a conversation with him when he asked about what books they read or what they thought about the summer reading. His second period seemed to go by so much faster than his first period and before he knew it, it was lunch.

Just like the kids, he was ready for it. Ready to give his voice a break and to relax for just a little bit before he had to do everything all over yet again.

Jared gathered his lunch and found his way to the teachers’ lounge that Jensen had advised Jared to use. He stood in front of the door, lunch in hand and frowned as he read the sign that was plastered on the door.

History Department.

He was sure that he went the right way to the right lounge that Jensen had told him to go too. Even the number that was hanging above the door matched the number that Jensen told him but this wasn’t a teacher's lounge. This was the… history department.

Jared was about to turn around and eat in his classroom, coax it down to that he went the wrong way and had no idea where Jensen was talking about when the door suddenly opened in front of him and Jensen was standing there. The moment that he saw Jared, his face lit up.

“Jared, I thought that you got lost or that Misha called you back into his office.” Jensen said, grabbing Jared’s arm and yanked him into the room that he just walked out of. “If that was the case, I was about to come and save you.”

Jared frowned, taking his arm back and closed the door behind him. “Jensen… um… are you sure that we’re in the right room… that you told me about the right room cause, you know, the sign on the door says that this is the history department and I was looking for a…”

“For a sign that said the teachers lounge. Yes, I know but trust me, you don’t wanna eat there. Just take my word on that. You don’t wanna be surrounded by a bunch of middle aged women complaining about how disrespectful kids are these days. I made that mistake my first year here. This is so much better.”

“But this is… the history department.” Jared said like it was the only thing that he could think of.

Jensen turned back to Jared with a smile on his face. “And you’re looking at the head of the history department. And one of the great perks about being the head is that I get my own office thanks to our very wonderful principal.”

Jared stood there awkwardly, mouth opening and closing as he thought of something to say. How the hell was Jensen already the head of the history department? Wasn’t that job usually given to the teachers with the most seniority? He would think so.

Jensen looked up at Jared after he sat down at the little table that was in the middle of the room and frowned at the look on Jared’s face. “I mean… um… I can tell you where the actual teacher lounge is if you prefer to eat in there.” He rubbed the back of his neck like it was some kind of nervous habit. “I just thought that you would like to be treated like the highly educated professional you are and not some first year teacher who needs advice from everyone on how to run your classroom.”

Jared wasn’t sure if he was reading into something or not but Jensen actually sounded hurt by the idea that Jared might want to eat somewhere else.

“What? No!” Jared sputtered, stumbling through his words as he quickly tried to reassure Jensen that he didn’t want to leave. His face felt like it was on fire. “It’s just… you have your own office? I mean… And then also you’re the head of the history department. How the hell did you manage to do that? Hell, who did you have to kill to get that job?”

Jensen laughed but it sounded a little bit hollow and something dark crossed over his eyes but it was gone before Jared could really notice it. Nonetheless, Jared immediately felt like he said something he shouldn’t have, that there were secrets that Jared didn’t know about.

“Kill?” Jensen finally said after a tense moment, a smile on his face like he was trying to keep the mood light but there was something that still didn’t settle right with Jared. “I didn’t kill anyone but I do have to say that it pays well to be best friends with the principal of the school.”

“You’re… best friends with Mr. Collins?” Jared breathed out, his heart suddenly thudding in his chest. He was very glad that he didn’t start complaining about the god-awful meetings that Mr. Collins forced him to go too. The last thing he wanted was for Jensen to tell his new boss how much he was complaining.

This time when Jensen laughed, it sounded genuine.

“Mr. Collins?” He laughed around the name. “I forget how formal all of you first year teachers are. You know, you can just call him Misha, right?”

Jared stared at Jensen like he was crazy. “I can’t… I can’t just call my boss by his first name. That’s not professional.”

The smile didn’t leave his face. “Sure ya can. If he says anything about it then you can just say that I told you that it was okay. Everyone calls him Misha. Even the students. Now are you just going to stand there in the doorway like stranger or are you going to have a seat and enjoy your few minutes of freedom before you have to go back to teaching those little devils.”

“I actually have several minutes of freedom. I have my off period next.”

Jensen seemed happy by that statement. “That’s great. I have my prep period next too. And it’s well needed.”

Jared nodded as he sat down across the table from Jensen and popped open the lid on his rubbermaid container. The day before he had spent all day meal prepping for the next week and for today’s lunch, he popped one of those frozen lasagna in the oven and portioned out himself a rather big helping. Jensen looked at it and then back down at the sandwich that he had for his lunch and frowned inwardly a little bit.

“Do you want the first bite?” Jared asked, offering Jensen his fork and Jensen took it gratefully.

He moaned around the fork, acting as if the bite was the best thing that he had ever eaten in his life. He wiped the fork before handing it back to Jared, licking his lips. Jared had to keep himself from staring at them while he did so.

“That was delicious.” Jensen admitted. “A whole lot better than this.” He gestured to the sandwich.

Jared just shrugged. “It’s nothing. I mean, just a frozen lasagna that I popped in the oven.”

“Are you kidding me, it so much better than a sandwich. I expect to have a serving myself tomorrow being that I’m sharing my office with you for lunch.” Jensen said with faux authority in his voice but Jared agreed nonetheless.

They fell into easy conversation, Jensen asking Jared about his first two classes, making sure that no one gave him too much trouble for being new. Jared blushed at the way that Jensen sounded like he was actually going to fight if he found out that someone actually caused too much trouble.

That conversation quickly lead into Jensen telling about his first year teaching at Northside and Jared assumed that everyone at the school fell in love with Jensen the moment he walked through the front doors. I mean, how could they not? With his swagger and charm and his amazing looks, everyone would be hopelessly in love with him.

Except that’s not how it went down. As soon as the other teachers learned that Jensen was friends with the principal, they all treated him like some kind of parasite, keeping him at arm's distance, always speaking in hushed whispers whenever he was close. No one wanted to talk to him for fear that Jensen would then turn around and tell Misha everything that he had heard from his fellow colleagues. Not to mention, there was the whole controversy with Jensen getting the department head position over many of the teachers that had tenure.

The fact that Jensen felt like he wasn’t welcomed in the school his first year teaching there had something pulling at Jared’s heart. No one as charming as him should ever feel alienated in the school at which they teach.

Jared had lost track of time and actually jumped when the bell that signaled the ending of third period sounded. Jensen helped him clean up his lunch, reminding him about that second helping of lasagna and walked Jared back to him room. Just to make sure that Jared did lose his way in the mass of students. At least, that’s the reason that Jensen stated.

He hung around in the doorway for a moment taking in Jared’s room and sighed.

“You really need to do something with this room. A person like you should not have to teach in a room that looks this boring.” Jensen said through another sigh as he looked all over the room, seeming as if he was talking more to himself than anyone in particular.

But Jared still heard and something tightened in his chest, in a good way, at the compliment. “Well, Mr. Collins said that the building was going to be open this weekend and I was planning on coming up here and at least slap some paint up on the walls. I feel like I’ll go crazy if I have to see that jailhouse gray any longer than I have too.”

Something in Jensen’s eyes seemed to shine just a little brighter.

Out of nowhere, he pulled out a pen from his back pocket and grabbed Jared’s hand. Before Jared had time to ask what he was doing, Jensen was already scribbling out a number across the back of his hand.

“Give me a call when you come here Saturday and I’ll help you paint.” Jensen winked. “Oh and, you don’t need to call Misha Mr. Collins.”

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

True to Jared’s word, he brought Jensen a portion of the baked lasagna and when Jared pulled it out to give to Jensen, his entire face lit up like he couldn’t believe that Jared actually brought him some. Jared watched in rapt attention as Jensen wolfed down his meal, barely stopping to breathe until it was completely finished.

“It’s just a frozen lasagna.” Jared stated, a little bewildered when Jensen finished.

He wiped his mouth and shrugged his shoulders. “It’s good. I’m used to turkey and ham sandwiches. I usually don’t have time to make stuff like this. Even if all I have to do is shove it into the oven and wait forty-five minutes.”

Jared chuckled and then finished up his own meal before the bell rang, pulling him back into his own room. He had to teach third period on B days and then he was off for fourth period. He was looking forward to getting home early and relaxing just a little bit on his own couch before he had to start preparing for the next day.

Regardless, Jared brought Jensen another helping of lasagna for lunch the next day. And then the next day. And he still brought Jensen some even after Jensen insisted that he was only joking about Jared bringing him lasagna as payment to eat in his office. He didn’t have to do that. Jared just couldn’t help himself. He liked to see the smile that was on Jensen’s face when Jared presented him with yet another container full of the food and the way that he devoured it like a starved man.

And the thing was, Jensen seemed to make the simple task of eating seem so damn sexual. He would moan around the bite of food like it was quite honestly the best thing that he’s ever eaten and he would close his lips around the fork like he was getting paid for it.

Jared caught himself wondering if Jensen was just doing it to fuck around with Jared or if he truly did like it was some sort of sexual experience.

Jensen was slowly convincing Jared to stop calling the principal Mr. Collins and by his first name, Misha even though that Jared still felt slightly uncomfortable at it. He wasn’t used to calling his boss by their first name. It wasn’t how he was raised. It was a sign of respect to call someone by their last name when they were in a position of authority. Still, Jensen smiled when Jared yet again called him Mr. Collins whenever he was talking about yet another meeting that he was pulled into or another form that he had to fill out.

He was pleasantly surprised to find out that all of the kids in his class were pretty good kids. That was one of the things that, though he would rather not admit, he had nightmares about before he started working. He went to school with enough kids that gave their teachers trouble and the last thing he wanted was to have one of those kids sit front and center of his classroom, causing him to go gray way before he had any right to. 

Granted, there were a couple of kids that had a big personality on them and that Jared had to reign in but overall, they were pretty good. Everyone had warned him that high school kids, especially seniors were awful. They were at that point in their schooling career that they didn’t care about school and so they didn’t care about authority.

Even Jensen was slightly surprised to find that he had a good group of kids too. Of course since his class was an elective class, it meant that there were students that just signed up because they heard that it was an easy A class. It had Jensen tearing his hair out because he taught it like an AP class and they had never taken one before and they weren’t prepared for the workload. He purposely taught the first couple of weeks a lot harder than the rest of year just so that he could get those kids that didn’t really need to be in the class, to get out while they could before it ruined their GPA.

Jensen said that there were already kids failing his class and it was only the first week of school.

The only saving grace with Jared’s class was that the students had to be recommended by their previous english teacher, otherwise they weren’t allowed to take his class. He was already slowly losing his sanity with this group of kids that he got, as well mannered as they might be, many of them weren’t taught the things that they needed to know to do well in the class. Which meant that in the matter of a few weeks, he was going to have to teach years worth of english to get them all caught up. Jared wasn’t sure how long we would last if he had to put up with kids that were nothing but trouble in addition to that.

All throughout lunch and their off periods, people who taught any kind of history class would come into Jensen’s office to ask him all different kinds of questions. Jared noticed, very early on, that no matter how easily the rest of the staff thought that Jensen climbed to the top and gotten the head of the history department, they all treated him respect and valued his opinion on whatever they were asking about.

He would review lesson plans that people brought him to look over, different assignments that they thought would be good to teach, different lessons and when to teach them in the year. They all seeked some kind of confirmation that what they were doing was right. Jared would watch the way that Jensen’s brow would furrow together as he would scribble notes on the sheets on paper that they handed to him. Sometimes he would have to reach into his shoulder bag that he brought with him and pulled out a pair of glasses which would almost immediately bring a blush to his cheeks and as soon as he was done looking at whatever he was looking at, he would shove them back into his bag.

Jared thought it was honestly adorable, the way that he would blush and pretend that he didn’t need glasses.

And Jared would also watch the way that some of the younger teachers would leave lingering touches on the back of Jensen’s hand as he took back whatever they asked him to look at. Or the way that they would grip his shoulder for just a second too long whenever they passed by and thanked him for everything he did before slipping out of the room.

Jared couldn’t help but feel the pit of jealousy that started to form in his stomach as he watched them do that, like he had anything to be jealous of in the first place.

Jensen never seemed to paid them two more seconds of attention than what they needed.

He would always answer their question, tell them his opinion on what they should change and then he would forget that they were there, his eyes trained back on Jared, listening intently as Jared picked up the story where it was left off.

By Friday, Jared was exhausted, wanting to do nothing more than to curl up underneath his desk and take a nap until the day was over. Unfortunately, he couldn’t do that so instead of sleeping under his desk, he was seated at his desk, grading a few papers that needed to be graded. There was a soft knock at his door and when smiled when he looked up. Jensen was standing there in the doorway, a cup of coffee in either hand, one that was specifically for Jared.

Jared took it more than gratefully, downing a long sip, waiting for the caffeine for it and then asked if Jensen had a shot of whiskey to put in it. Anything to keep him alive until the end of the day. He already knew that the kids were going to be absolutely wild today, being that it was the last day of school of the first week and everyone was ready to get home for the weekend.

Honestly Jared wasn’t sure how he was going to last through the few short hours of school, much less spending the entire day up here tomorrow.

Jensen laughed, saying that next week he would remember that shot of whiskey as he sat down on the top of one of the desks and they talked about nothing until the bell rang and Jensen had to run back to his room before his kids jokingly scolded him for being late to class once again.

The longer that the day dragged on, the more that Jared was regretting making the decision to come up to school the next day to paint. He was drained of any and all energy and the thought of spending another long, grueling day at school sucked even more energy out of him. However the only thing that kept Jared from completely forgetting about painting his classroom and staying in all day was the fact that Jensen had agreed to come up and help paint and the prospect of spending all day with Jensen without the interruptions of kids or other teachers made his heart skip a beat and butterflies flutter around in his stomach.

There wasn’t much for Jared to do, his kids were doing their first timed writing of the year over the book that they were supposed to have read over the summer and he was seated at his desk, getting a head start on grading the essays that his previous class’s wrote and seriously tried not to get a headache as he read through the awful handwriting and poorly constructed essays. The clock on the wall seemed to slow down every time he glanced up at it, waiting for the final bell of the day to ring.

Everyone jumped up at the sound of the bell, turning their essays into the box and rushing outside to the hallway, eager to get home. A couple of the kids wished him a good weekend and Jared smiled a tired smile back at them before getting back to grading.

God, what he would give to go back to those days where all he needed to worry about was actually finishing essays, not grading them and studying for test, not creating them.

Since the kids left the building and there was no one left in his classroom that he could offend with his musical preference, he turned up the music that was playing through his computer, letting the sound fill his room.

For the first time that week, he appreciated having the classroom at the end of the hallway away from anyone and anything. It meant that he could play his music as loudly as he wanted without anyone coming to him and complaining about the sound, not that he expected anybody to stay later than they absolutely had to stay. He was probably going to be the only one left in the building come six and he was perfectly okay with that.

He wasn’t sure he could socialize with anyone without snapping their head off.

“I swear you’re a guy after my own heart.” Jensen’s voice came suddenly from the doorway nearly making Jared jump through the roof, his heart racing in his chest. He didn’t hear him enter the room.

The man moved like a lynx.

Dramatically, Jared placed a hand over his heart, trying to steady his breathing as he sent death glares toward Jensen as he reached out to turn down the music to the point that they could have a conversation.

“You bring me lunch everyday and you listen to Led Zep. Can you get anymore perfect?” Jensen asked as he sat back on top of one of the desk that was closest to Jared’s desk, resting his arms on his knees. Jared was sure that his heart rate was never going to come down at this point. Not if Jensen kept saying things like that and looking at him like that.

In fact, he could feel the blush painting across his face at the comment.

If Jensen noticed, he didn’t say anything.

“So, are you still up for coming here and painting tomorrow morning or did the little devils suck every last bit of your soul out of your body?” Jensen asked, trying to get some kind of conversation started between the two of them. He looked at Jared expectantly, waiting for him to say something but the words seemed trapped in his mouth. “Did the little devils take your voice as well as your sanity or was that my fault? Did I scare it out of you?”

Jared glared at him as he leaned back in his chair, suddenly finding the ability to speak again. “Oh, don’t think so highly of yourself. You didn’t do such a thing.” Then he sighed. “And unfortunately I told Mr. Collins that I was going to come up here tomorrow so he’s expecting me.”

The corner of Jensen’s mouth quirked up, an amused smirk on his lips. “You know, I’ve told you about calling him Mr. Collins.”

Jared just rolled his eyes and crumpled up a stray piece of paper to throw at Jensen. Sure, he’s got him to call his boss Misha a couple of times, it didn’t mean that he was completely comfortable with it and was going to start referring to him as that all the time. Jensen caught the ball easily, the stupid, perfect bastard and threw it back at Jared who didn’t so effortlessly catch it and let the paper ball bounce off his chest.

“Anyway…” Jared said with another roll of his eyes but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face. “I don’t think that it would reflect too good on me if he left the building unlocked for me and I just decide not to show up. No matter how much I wanna get drunk tonight and stay in bed all day tomorrow watching Netflix and pretending that I don’t have anything to do.”

“They’ve been that bad, huh?” And the thing that absolutely floored Jared was the fact that Jensen sounded genuinely interested in what Jared was talking about. There were too many people that Jared ran into throughout the week that didn’t care, they were only trying to make some sort of sorry excuse for small talk.

“The kids? No, they’ve been fine. More than fine actually. It’s the teachers here that think they can run into my classroom and tell me how to teach the kids, like I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. If they’re this bad during the first week of school, I can’t imagine how bad they’re going to be halfway through the year when exams roll around.”

Jensen chuckled at that, nodding in what Jared assumed to be him agreeing. “Ah… I remember that days. My first year year, everyone in the history department felt like it was their personal duty to give me their two cents on the way that I should teach. When they realized that I actually knew what I was doing, they back off but it only took me blowing their test scores out of the water.”

“Alrighty then…” Jared smiled. “I know what my goal is for the end of the year. Get all of my kids to ace their final exams. And you know what, if they fail them, I’ll just forge all their scores.”

The smile didn’t leave Jensen’s face. “That’s right. The best way to end the year is to commit a small felony.”

“Let’s just hope that I can make it until the end of the year.” Jared muttered, capping the pen that he was using to grade, shoving it into the coffee cup that held the rest of the pens.

Jensen watched, even offering to grade a couple of papers but Jared politely denied the offer. There was no need to make Jensen suffer through the awful grammar and poor handwriting. One person suffering was enough.

Silence quickly fell over the two of them as Jared filed away the rest of the essays, making a couple of last seconds changes to the lesson plans as he did so. Jensen busied himself with erasing and cleaning off the whiteboard, making sure that there wasn’t a mark left and like everything else Jensen did, Jared was more than grateful for it. Maybe with Jensen sticking around like this, he could afford to have small luxuries as sparkling clean whiteboards.

After spending another hour of making small talk with Jensen and grading smaller assignments that didn’t require a lot of brain activity, he finally shoved everything in the shoulder bag that he carried from home to school, not caring if anything was in order. He wanted to get home, change into a pair of sweats, crack open a beer, order take-out and not move until tomorrow morning when he would have to come right back up to school.

He was already mentally debating the pros and cons of getting Chinese delivery or pizza for dinner.

Nighttime had already fallen, the sun settling down below the horizon line, making the school look completely different than it did in the daytime. Jensen, the ever caring gentleman that he was, walked with Jared to his car, making sure that he got there safely. Despite the fact that he was a six-four man who was born and raised in Texas who could more than hold his own, he was glad for the company. During the day, the neighborhood was completely fine to walk out alone, but once the sun dipped down behind the tree line, all the crazies came out and it wasn’t necessarily safe to walk out alone, no matter how tall you were.

Jared climbed into his truck which had been passed down to him from his father as Jensen grabbed a hold of the door, waiting to bid Jared a goodnight and close it behind him.

“When are you planning on coming up here tomorrow?” Jensen asked, still holding onto the door, not ready to say goodbye just yet.

“Oh… um…” Jared swallowed as he thought about what time he wanted to get up. Maybe not until Monday morning. “I’m not too sure. I don’t know how long it’s gonna take to get the room painted but… uhh… I don’t know. Maybe around eight.” Jared scrambled through his words, trying to find Jensen a time. “But if you don’t wanna wake up at eight, you don’t have too. I mean…”

“How ‘bout this, text me in the morning when you get here and I’ll show up.” Jensen smiled.

Jared nodded, agreeing and he was about to close the door when he realized that he didn’t actually have Jensen’s number. He glanced down at his hand, where Jensen had scribbled it down a week before but the ink had already long faded and Jared mentally groaned.

“Umm… I don’t actually have your number. I might have accidentally washed it away.” Jared said, feeling his cheeks heat up. 

That smile only deepened on Jensen’s face. “Yeah, I figured that. You never texted me when I gave you my number at the beginning of the week. I thought that you…” But he lead off before he could finish his statement and stuck out his hand for Jared’s phone expectantly. “So give me your phone and I’ll put my number in there before you forget it again.”

“Yeah… yeah, okay.” Jared said fumbling through his bag for his phone that seemed to disappear. “I totally meant to text you but I… I don’t know. I got busy and forgot to text you and by the time I remembered, it was already washed away and I mean, we ate lunch together everyday and so I didn’t think that I needed it and…” He was rambling, secretly relieved when his fingers closed around his phone and he handed it over to Jensen.

Jared didn’t miss the way that his skin seem to burn as it came in contact with Jensen’s and those pesky little butterflies that made Jared want to throw up were back.

After a moment of Jared watching Jensen chew on his bottom lip as he typed in his number on his phone, Jensen handed it back with a wide smile. “I’m available anytime tomorrow, alright. I’ve got nothing planned but to grade a couple of papers but that can wait. And hey…” Jensen grabbed a hold of Jared’s hand as Jared turned momentarily to shove his phone back in his bag. Jared froze, completely caught under Jensen’s hand. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call, okay? I mean it, anything. That number is for you to use.”

Jared could only nod as he threw his phone into the passenger seat, mind completely blank as to what he was doing before Jensen grabbed him and told him that. His heart was beating so hard and so fast that Jared knew that Jensen could hear it. He only wasn’t saying anything because he was kind enough not to comment on things like that. Then, with that same smile that never left his lips, Jensen bid Jared a good night and closed the door.

Jared watched as Jensen walked over to his own car, waving slightly before getting in and driving away. He sat there for longer than what was necessary, his mind in a daze. He had Jensen’s number in his phone, should have had it in there earlier and Jensen said to call him about anything.

Which, I mean, anyone would do for a first year teacher, make them feel welcomed and like they had a friend who would have their back but Jared couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something more to his statement than to just call him if he needed help with school. Like Jared was supposed to read between the lines and pick up what he was subtly trying to say. He was an English major, went to school to discover the purpose of every written word and most literature had a double meaning if only one knew how hard to look.

But it was fucking ridiculous. There was no that the god on bowlegs was anywhere remotely interested in him. Jensen was doing nothing more than being nice.

At least, that’s what he kept telling himself as he drove back to his humble abode. A small, one bedroom house in just a slightly sketchy part of town. He couldn’t let his mind wander over to the thoughts that he might actually be interested into something more than just a lunch buddy. At the moment, he was in a stable place. He had a good job, a place to live. Things were good and the last thing he needed was feelings to go off and screw things up for him.

It was just a short drive from school and before he really knew it, he pulled up in front of his house, just sitting in the driveway.

Jared grabbed his shoulder bag from the passenger seat and shut the car door behind him,  rummaging around in his bag for the keys to his house.

He sighed heavily as he tried to push the door open but it was jammed in the doorframe. So today was going to be one of those days. The landlord had promised to fix it when he first moved in but, like with many other things that Jared kept discovering was wrong with the house, it had yet to be worked on. He slammed his shoulder against the side of the door, pushing it open.

He hug his bag up on the hook that was near the door, kicking off his shoes and shrugged off his jacket, throwing it over the back of the arm chair. Then he made his way over to the fridge, pulling out a beer, popping the top and plopped down on his couch. He took a good long sip, wishing for something a little stronger to get rid of the headache that he was sporting but he knew that if he started drinking hard liquor, he wouldn’t want to wake up in the morning to go paint.

So he turned on the tv, pulled out some chicken and heated it up in the microwave as he watched the nightly news before cleaning up a little bit and retiring to bed.

The alarm went off at seven a.m. sharp and Jared absolutely did not want to get out of bed. He was still dog-tired, feeling as if he hadn’t slept at all but nonetheless, he threw the blankets off his body and got up. He took a quick shower before he brushed his teeth. He planned on getting something to eat on his way to school.

As he dressed for the day, pulling on a pair of torn jeans and a t-shirt that was already covered in paint from previous remodels, Jared looked down at his phone, finger hovering Jensen’s number.

He wanted to call Jensen, tell him that he was heading up to school and yet he couldn’t bring himself to. He was just being nice. That voice said in the back of his head as he shoved his phone into his back pocket. Even though he said that you could call him any time, he didn’t really mean it. There was no double meaning. There was no point in trying to read into anything because there was nothing to read into. Jensen didn’t really want to be called at eight in the morning just to go back up to school to paint.

With a sigh, Jared locked up his house and walked down the stairs toward his car. He thought about calling Jensen, or at least sending him a text, saying that he was headed up to school but once again he opted against it. He wasn’t going to disturb him on his weekend.

School was an odd place to be when there was no one there. No students, no other teachers. The parking lot was nearly empty as he pulled into the place and it meant that he got the best spot but still, it felt weird not to have anyone else around.

He grabbed the paint from his trunk and headed towards the building.

True to Misha’s word, he kept the back door down by the cafeteria unlocked, meaning that he was able to get inside. For the most of Jared’s life, he was inside hallways that were always bursting with students but there was no one around. Only his footsteps echoed off the hallways. The automatic lights turned on as he walked towards his room.

It was almost like a ghost town.

It only took him a couple more trips to get everything that he needed for the day. He got the drip cloths and the paintbrushes and rollers and pans and tape and anything else the guy at the paint store recommended that he might want to use and yet Jared couldn’t help but feel like he had forgotten something else.

Like, for instance, he needed a ladder. He didn’t realize that until he was standing in the middle of his room, looking up at the corners of his room and wondering how the hell he was going to get paint up there. He might be tall. Yeah, sure, but he wasn’t that tall. That was going to be a problem that he was going to have to figure at some other point. Right now, he was going to do what he could do and that was paint what he could reach.

A couple hours of moving everything out of his classroom and into the hall, Jared was already hating his decision not to call Jensen for help. He wasn’t weak by any means of the imagination but having another pair of hands to move everything would have been helpful. Besides, just having the company would have been nice too. The silence of the school was starting to wear on him, get underneath his skin.

Schools weren’t meant to be quite. They were meant to be filled with learning and the sound of chatter and whatever else.

Once everything was out of his room, Jared went to work removing everything off the walls. There was gum and hot glue and tacky glue stuck everywhere. He got rid of everything that he was able to reach and then he had to figure out a way to remove everything out of arm reach. Which meant he had to go off to look for a ladder.

After tracking down and raiding the janitor’s office for one, he was up on one of the higher rungs, a paint scraper in his hand, scraping off the gum from the walls. It was still a wonder to him how the hell those kids managed to get gum up there and actually have it stick. It was a mystery that he was probably never going to figure out. Unless, of course, he asked the kids. Like they were actually going to tell him. There was no way that they were going to incriminate themselves just to appease his curiosity.

“You stood me up this morning, Mr. Padalecki.” A voice echoed around his small room from the doorway.

Jared jumped, so caught up in his own thoughts and the task at hand that he didn’t realize Jensen was standing there in the doorway. He grabbed the top of the ladder, holding himself to it so he didn’t fall backwards as he willed his heart to stop beating through his chest. To say the least, Jensen startled him to the point of a mini heart attack.

He climbed back down the ladder, setting down the scraper on one of the desks that he kept in the room and met Jensen halfway.

Jensen was holding two coffees in his hands, a faux frown on his face and looking as beautiful as ever. He was dressed similar to Jared, jeans and a worn t-shirt. His hair looked as if he had rolled out of bed, completely foregoing styling it and it just made him look even younger, if that was possible.

“I...umm…” Jared could feel himself starting to blush as he took the coffee that Jensen held out to him. “I didn’t… I didn’t stand you up. I just thought that you might… that you wouldn’t have wanted to come back up to school… on a Saturday.” He was rambling again, slightly stuttering through his words like he suddenly didn’t know how to speak.

“I’m just teasing you, Jared.” Jensen said with a smile and a small laugh, choosing to take a seat at one of the desk that Jared purposely kept in the room just so that he could have room to keep stuff on top of.

Jared returned the laugh even though he felt like he was on fire.

“Well, you didn’t miss much… unless, of course, you were really looking forward to scraping gum off the walls.” Jared said after taking a sip of the coffee that Jensen brought him. It was good, better than the cheap stuff that Jared bought at the gas station on the way to school earlier that morning.

“Well, damn, that’s my favorite part.”

“Maybe next time.” Jared suggested, taking another sip of coffee before setting down the paint scraper and picked up a gallon of paint. He picked out a light blue color, one that was much better than the boring gray on the walls but not so exciting that it would distract the students.

Jensen stood up, leaving his coffee on the table as he stood next to Jared, picking up a paint tray so that Jared could pour the paint into it. Jared popped off the lid and poured a healthy amount. Jensen placed that tray to the side and grabbed the other one so that they had two. Then Jensen grabbed one, took a roller and walked to one side of the room. He coated the roller in paint and then started rolling the paint up onto the wall.

Jared watched him work for a moment, watching the way that Jensen’s shirt clung to his muscles, working underneath the thin, cotton material. Several moments passed before Jared realized that he was staring and he physically had to tear away his gaze until Jensen turned back around and caught him in the act.

He took his own paint tray and went to the opposite wall from Jensen and went to work himself.

It was easy to lather on the paint in the middle part of the wall, on the parts where he didn’t have to be precise with the line work but it was quick and easy and all too soon he needed to do the fine line work along the edges of the wall.

However, instead of starting on the line work, he moved to another wall, painting that one while Jensen moved to the other one.

They finished painting the walls around one, all but the tedious line work and Jared was starving. He didn’t have much for breakfast. Just a granola bar in addition to that coffee. It was about time to eat but he didn’t think to bring anything for lunch and there was still work to be done.

Jared braced himself against one of the desk with a heavy sigh and looked down at his clothes. He had somehow managed to cover himself in paint. He didn’t understand how he made such a mess of himself when all he was doing was rolling the paint up on the wall and yet he was covered in it. Jensen finished painting the last little section of his wall before he joined Jared resting against the desk. He looked around the room, taking note of how it suddenly seemed brighter with the new coat of paint.

“It looks good.” Jared said. “Only have to finish up the corners and the edges and we’ll be done.”

“I might have to get you to paint my room when we’re finished.” Jensen stated simply and Jared’s heart leapt at the prospect of it. He would do anything if it meant that he spent more time with him.

Still, Jared blushed liked he always seemed to do now when he was around Jensen and he pushed off the desk, grabbing a paintbrush in order to get started on the edges.

Jensen frowned, staring at Jared. He was starving, surely Jared was starving too. He always ate tons when they were on their lunch break and they ate at twelve. He watched for several moments as Jared dipped the brush down into the paint and then started applying it to the wall.

Finally, with another sigh, he stood up and placed his hand on Jared’s shoulder, causing him to turn around.

“What are you doing, Jared?” Jensen asked.

“Umm... “ Jared looked down at the brush that was in his hand and then back up at his co-worker. “I’m finishing up painting.”

“No. You’re not.” Jensen said in that tone of voice that meant that there was no arguing with him. “Come on. Since you stood me up this morning, I’m taking you out to lunch.” Jared opened his mouth like he was going to try to object but Jensen beat him to the punch. “Nope. There’s no arguing about it, Mr. Padalecki. It’s lunchtime, I’m hungry, I’m sure that you are too and you owe me. So… we’re going to lunch.”

Jared looked down at himself, with all the paint splattered on himself. “Like this? But… I’m covered in paint. I’m a mess.”

“Then we’ll be a mess together.” Jensen said as if it was the simplest thing in the world.

“A mess together?” Jared exclaimed. “You have no paint on you. Like, at all. You’re just as clean as you were when you came up here this morning.”

Jensen looked down at his clothes and then chuckled to himself. “I’m just a cleaner person, I guess.”

Jared narrowed his eyes at him before he looked down at the paintbrush in his hand, an idea suddenly flashing across his mind. A very good idea, if he said so himself. A smirk pulled at the corner of his lips as Jared all the sudden pulled back the bristles of the paintbrush and let go. The paint that was still on it, splattered all across Jensen.

Jensen gasped, pretending to be shocked but there was a playful glint in his eye.

“Oh, you shouldn’t have done that, Padalecki.” Jensen threatened, that smirk still on his lips.

Jensen turned and picked up a paintbrush of his own, dipping it in the little bit of paint that was left in the paint tray and turned back to Jared, flicking paint on him just as Jared did to him.

It didn’t take much to turn it into an out and out war. Jared slipped past Jensen, picking back up his tray, dipping his paintbrush  into the paint and positioned himself in a stance that showed he was on the defense. Jensen mirrored Jared’s position, both of them poised, ready to splatter more paint. They stood like that, staring at each other, a smirk on both of their lips as they waited for the other to make the first move.

It ended up being Jared. He lunged forward, paint bristles aimed and it splattered against Jensen. Jensen retaliated just as quickly, getting more paint on Jared.

It turned into a war that was full of laughter. More paint was flung across the room, ending up on the already covered walls, the dingy carpet, on the few desks that Jared had left in the room. Jared was going to have to clean it all up but honestly, at the moment, he didn’t care. He would throw paint everywhere if it meant that he got to listen to the laughs that erupted from Jensen’s chest every time he got hit or he hit Jared.

“Okay…” Jensen held up his hands in a way of surrender, his body still shaking with laughter. “Okay. What do yah say, we call it a truce? Huh?”

Jared kept a playful frown on his face, looking between Jensen’s paint splattered clothes and his own. “You’re only wanting to call it a truce because you know that I clearly won and you just don’t want to admit defeat.”

It was clear that Jensen was covered in more paint than Jared was and of course, Jared wasn’t biased at all. He was just calling it like he saw it. 

Jensen scoffed and jutted his chin out like a defiant child who didn’t want to admit that he lost, that lighthearted glint still  in his eyes. “You’re the one who’s clearly covered in more paint and I’ve, thus far, have been the undefeated paint champion. I won’t let some first year take that away, Padalecki.”

“Oh yeah?” Jared challenged back. “You have paint battles with all the first years?”

“Only the cute ones.” Jensen said with a wink and Jared didn’t have a response for that.

Unless, of course, you call blushing like a little school girl and staring down at his scuffed sneakers a response. Then, out of nowhere with no warning, a glob of paint landed on Jared’s face, wet and slightly cold and Jared most certainly did not squeal in surprise. It was more like a manly squawk, just a little higher pitch.

“I win.” Jensen said matter-of-factly, his paintbrush in his hand held high like a trophy and with the huge smile that Jensen had on his face, Jared wasn’t going to argue with it.

“Cheater.” Jared mumbled under his breath as he wiped away the paint with the back of his hand and dunked his paintbrush in a cup of water. “Someone promised me lunch.”

“You’re right. Lunch. I did say that I would get you lunch.” Jensen dunked the paintbrush in another cup of water and wiped the remaining paint from his face before he started towards the door.

Jared quickly moved towards his desk to grab his keys but Jensen turned on him.

“Leave those there. I’m driving.” Jensen stated like there was no room for argument and Jared didn’t doubt that for a moment.

Still, he couldn’t help himself. “But…”

“Nope.” Jensen said popping the p. He squared his shoulders and tried to look serious but with all the paint that it was on him, it did nothing. “Just come one, man. It’s my treat and besides, I kinda owe you since you brought me lunch everyday this week. Let me do this.” And just like that, Jared could see through that cocky bravado that Jensen wore so well. He could see straight through to the shy person that was just underneath the surface.

With an over dramatic sigh, Jared dropped the keys on his desk, making a show of pretending to be disgruntled by the fact but in all reality, Jared’s heart was beating through his chest.

It’s not a date. Jared kept saying to himself on repeat as he followed the bowlegged siren that he was trying not to fall for but was desperately failing. It is not a date. He climbed into Jensen’s Jeep almost on autopilot and got buckled as he listened to whatever story that seemed to be on Jensen’s brain at the time.

It is not a date. 

However, his heart and his brain seemed not to listen to each other because every time Jensen sent him a small smile from across the cab of the car, Jared’s heart would flutter right in his chest, feeling as if it was just going to burst out.

Jensen pulled into a little burger joint that Jared’s never even heard of and Jensen clasped a hand around Jared’s shoulder at his questioning gaze.

“Trust me, this place has the best burgers you will ever have the honor of eating.” Jensen said around a smile. Like Jared was going to do anything less than trust him when it came to food.

The burger joint filled every single cliche there were about burger joints. It had the black and white checkerboard tiles with the red, vinyl booths lining the perimeter. There was the bar with the chrome leg and matching red vinyl seats. There was shoo-bop playing through the speakers, lively, upbeat songs that you could tap your foot to even if you didn’t know the name of the song. Various pies and cakes were sitting along the counter and all through the diner, there was the smell of burger and fries.

There was a little sign at the front that stated Seat Yourself and Jared followed Jensen towards the back of the diner, taking a seat at one of the booths.

They sat across together, knees nearly bumping against each other under the small table.

The menus were on the table, shoved between the salt and pepper shakers and the napkin dispenser. Jared reached across the table to grab one of the menus when Jensen slapped his hand away.

“Gonna save you the trouble of looking through the menu and order for you.” Jensen stated, leaning back in his seat, arm thrown over the back of the booth. “There’s really one thing worth ordering here.”

“Um… yeah, okay.” Jared replied back dumbly, feeling himself start to blush at the thought of Jensen ordering for him. There was really nothing to it. Friends order for friends all the time but still, it felt oddly intimate. The whole lunch thing felt oddly intimate. Jensen took him to his favorite burger place, is going to order for him and Jared didn’t doubt for a second that he was going to insist on picking up the check.

It didn’t take long for the waitress to show up and take their drink order. Jensen got water and a bottle of Shiner. Jared got the same and he didn’t miss the way that Jensen grinned at that.

She came back and placed their drinks down on the table, moving to take her little notepad out of the front of her apron that was tied around her waist.

“Alright, what can I get y’all to eat?” She asked, her southern drawl thick in her voice.

She was looking at Jared, waiting for him and Jared turned his gaze over to Jensen.

“We’ll take your triple stack. Everything on them.” Jensen answered and the waitress barely even glanced his way, her eyes still on Jared.

“What can I get for you, sugar?” She asked, turning her body just a little more towards him and Jared could practically hear Jensen smirking.

“Oh...umm… Yeah, uhh… he ordered… for the both of us.” Jared said blushing, the tips of his ears turning bright red.

The waitress glanced over at Jensen who was still sprawled across the seat, clearly amused at just how flustered Jared was with the girl very clearly flirting with him. She frowned, looking Jensen up and down for a moment before looking back at Jared. She pocketed the notebook and muttered that she would be out with their food in a moment. But, of course, not before she trailed her fingers over the back of Jared’s hand that was resting on top of the table.

Jared jerked his hands under the table as if he had been burned and Jensen had the audacity to laugh. He actually laughed.

“Dude, she was totally into you.” Jensen said, still laughing.

“She was not. She was just… being nice.” Jared said, opting to end the conversation by picking up his beer and taking a huge gulp from it.

“Mhmm, let’s see if she leaves you her number.”

Jared looked back towards the kitchen where she had disappeared into and he felt himself flushing even more. The way that she had looked over at Jensen and the way that her smile had faltered when Jared said that Jensen had ordered for him too, he doubted that she would leave him her number.

“Dude, she thinks that we’re together or something. You saw the way that she looked at us. There’s no way that she’s gonna leave her number.”

“Well, with you blushing the way you were when you said that I ordered for you, what else was she supposed to think?” Jensen laughed again. “Whatever. She’s cute. If it were me that she was hitting on, I wouldn’t object to it.”

Jared had to tear his gaze away from Jensen and that smiling face that was looking at nothing but him. He couldn’t shake the fact that Jensen didn’t even flinch at the fact that the waitress thought they were together. He acted as if it was the most natural thing in the world and never mind the fact that he said that he wanted to sleep with the girl if he had the chance.

It didn’t take long for their food to arrive and Jared didn’t waste any time digging into his burger. It was just as good as Jensen hyped it up to be. And luckily, with the excuse of food, they didn’t talk anymore about the fact that the waitress was totally hitting on him.

When they finished their burgers, Jensen leaned back against the seat, just watching Jared.

“You know, she’s totally gonna leave you her number.” Jensen stated, cutting his gaze over to the waitress who kept watching Jared. She’d been over to their table more times than he could count, making sure that his glass was always filled to the brim and asking if he wanted anything for desert.

He didn’t want anything and he said that but she appeared a few minutes later with a strawberry shortcake. ‘Her treat’ she said before she slipped off again blushing.

Jared shook his head as circled the rim of his glass with his fingertip. “She’s not gonna do that. She’s just being nice.”

“Mhmm.” Jensen smirked as he finished off his beer.

As he had predicted, when she came back with the check, she gave it to Jared and under the total was her number and ‘Michelle’ written in a curly cursive. Before Jared could take out his card to pay for the meal, Jensen slapped down his credit card on the table and yanked the check away from Jared. He laughed when he saw the number sprawled out on the bottom of the check.

“What’d I tell yah, man? You gonna call her or what?” Jensen asked after Michelle came and took his card to pay for the meal.

Jared knew that he probably should have lied and just said yes. And honestly, the girl was pretty and a couple of dates wouldn’t be too bad. It would be fun. Jared couldn’t remember the last time he took a girl, or anyone for that matter, out on a date but of whatever reason he shook his head.

“Naw, I don’t think so.” Jared replied.

“Why? You already got some girl I don’t know about?” He had an air of nonchalance about him but there was something lingering at the edge of his voice. Something not quite like jealousy but something close to it, like Jensen was jealous that Jared hadn’t told him something yet.

“No. It’s not that. It’s just…” Jared shrugged.

“Redheads not your type?”

Jared swallowed thickly and looked back down at the table, feeling his face heat up at the words that were about to come out of his mouth. “No. More like… chicks aren’t my type.” There was a moment of silence and Jared continued on, still not looking at Jensen. “I mean, I’ve dated plenty of girls before and well, wouldn’t mind it either it’s just… dudes, you know, it’s…”

“Hey, Jared, you don’t hafta explain yourself to me, man. You like guys and that’s perfectly cool with me.” And it sounded completely truthful, like Jensen wasn’t just saying that to end the conversation. It sounded like he actually meant it.

Jared raised his gaze back up to his friend and Jensen was still sprawled out across the seat, that easy smile still on his face, looking the same as he always has.

Then Jensen started to laugh and Jared furrowed his brow.

“God, I feel like an asshole now, trying to push this girl onto you. Shit man, why didn’t you tell me this before now?”

Jared shrugged again, still blushing. “Don’t know. I just… it never really came up in conversation and it’s not really something that I say as an icebreaker, yah know?”

When Michelle brought back Jensen’s card, they left the little diner and headed back to school. Jared kept looking for some kind of awkwardness or some kind of shift in their friendship or something with Jensen but he couldn’t find anything. With his whole experience of coming out to folks and saying ‘hey, I kinda like guys a little more than I like girls’ didn’t always bode well with people. 

Except Jensen just accepted it without questioning it. Like it was the easiest thing in the world.

They finished up painting when they returned to school and Jensen helped Jared move everything back into proper position.

They walked out together towards the parking lot, shoulder brushing up against shoulder and while things felt normal, comfortable even, there was something at the tip of Jared’s tongue that he wanted to say but just didn’t know the words to actually form the thought.

“Well, today was fun.” Jensen finally said when they got to Jared’s car and Jared stood there dumbly, not really looking at Jensen but also not really looking at anything else.

“Yeah… umm… yeah. It was fun and lunch… lunch was good too.” The words sounded short and Jensen furrowed his brow for a fraction of a second before he pulled himself back into that solid, happy, carefree resolve that he always had.

“Totally. If you have anything else you want to paint, don’t hesitate to call me. This time you can pick the place to eat.” Jensen smiled but it seemed a little off.

They stood there for a couple more seconds, the sun setting around them turning everything to a golden hue, as if Jensen needed to look any more beautiful than he already did.

“Well…” Another pause and things suddenly felt very awkward between the two of them, something that Jared hadn’t yet experienced while he had been hanging out with Jensen and he hated the feeling. His mouth felt dry and it felt like something heavy was sitting in his stomach and he wanted that feeling to be gone. “I guess I’ll see you Monday.”

“Yeah. Monday.” Jared shifted his weight to his other foot, trying to swallow around the lump in his throat. It was like he wasn’t able to.

Jensen gave a curt nod and then turned on his heel, walking toward the only other car in the parking lot. He got two, maybe three steps away when Jared rushed forward and closed his hand around Jensen’s shoulder, pulling him to a stop.

“Thank you.” He blurted out before Jensen even turned around.

And when Jensen did finally turn around, Jared wished that he had just gotten in his car and drove to his crappy house and hope that whatever awkwardness that was between them would have passed by Monday morning and things would be okay and Jared wouldn’t have to explain, or rather try to explain why he was suddenly thanking Jensen for this unknown thing.

And of course, it could have been easy for him to just pass it off as him thanking Jensen for coming up and helping him paint but the moment that Jensen turned around, a look of confusion on his face that was more adorable than it should have been, Jared’s mind went blank.

“Uhh… yeah, you’re welcome. You know I don’t mind helping yah out and you don’t have to keep thanking me for coming up here.” Jensen said with a small chuckle. “It was really no trouble. It wasn’t like I had any fun plans today to begin with.”

Throughout the day, Jared had thanked Jensen no less than about a million times for coming up to school on his weekend and spending hours in the boring and drab classroom, covered in paint and then buying lunch. Every time Jensen would say that it was no problem and that he was more than happy to come and help out.

“No, not about that. I mean, yeah, I do thank you about that but it’s not that. It’s about earlier today. With me and just… yeah. Thank you.” Jared felt like his whole body was shaking with anxiousness.

Jensen gave this tiny smile and then shook his head like it was no big deal. “You don’t have anything to thank me for. That’s just…”

“No, shut up.” Jared cut him off, a little more curtly than he meant to sound but he needed to get this out. Then he sighed, a long one that actually seemed to calm him and collected his thoughts. “I’m serious. Thank you. I wasn’t going to tell you, wasn’t planning on it and if I was going to, then it wasn’t going to be like that. I didn’t mean to blurt it out or anything but you… You didn’t… you didn’t turn it into this huge deal or anything and you didn’t start treating me any different or at least haven’t yet and just… I don’t know. It was… it was just really nice that someone still treats me normal after I tell them that I’m…” He was blushing again and it wasn’t helping that Jensen was just smiling. “So yeah, just thank you.”

“You know, you’ve been hanging out with real jackasses if they’ve started treating you differently after you told them that. Just gonna be the first one to say that. There’s no need to be worried or scared that I’m gonna treat you any different unless you tell me that you like to fuck goats or whatever…” Jared laughed because how could he not and before Jensen could continue, he pulled his friend into a hug.

A completely platonic hug that friends totally share and he tried not to think about how perfectly Jensen seemed to fit against him and how Jensen hugged him back and tucked his head over Jared’s shoulder as Jared somehow made himself smaller to fit against Jensen’s neck.

“Just… thank you, man.” Jared muttered. “Thank you.”

“Yeah, no problem, Jay.” Jensen squeezed Jared once before pulling away.

Jared watched as Jensen finally walked towards the Jeep and got in, waving one more time before Jared got into his own car and he wondered how he managed to get so lucky to score a friend like Jensen.

Sunday morning he slept in and woke up only to grade the rest of the essay’s that he didn’t finish grading over the past few days and crashed back into bed.

It was harder to get up the second Monday of the school year than it was to get up on the first. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go teach. He didn’t hate his job (even though everyone who’s been at the school says that he should just give it a month or two and he would hate it). He was excited to get to work and see his newly painted classroom. It was just that his bed was rather comfortable and it sounded much better than having to get to school.

Nonetheless, he got up out of bed, much to the prompting of the dogs who needed to go out.

Within twenty minutes, he feed the dogs, let them out, dressed for work and was in his car, driving towards the school.

As he entered into the parking lot, he couldn’t help but let the smile creep onto his face. Jensen was sitting on the bumper of his jeep, two cups off coffee in his hands and there was an empty spot right next to him. Jared could only assume that Jensen had saved it for him.

“Aren’t you here early?” Jared said as he got out of the car and gratefully accepted the cup Jensen handed his way. He took a sip and sighed happily. “God, you’re too good to me, Ackles.”

“Yeah, don’t get used to it. Thought that you might be dragging ass this morning and it turns out I was right.” They bumped shoulders as they walked towards the building. Jensen had his badge out and scanned it to unlock the door. “Cutting it a little close, don’t ya think? You have bus duty at eight this morning.”

Jared groaned. It was true. He had bus duty. He had to stand outside and make sure that all the kids that were on the bus, got off the bus and then headed into school. As the newest member of the teaching staff at Northside, he got the lucky job of having to be out there at eight.

“Why did you have to remind me?” Jared said with another groan. “I was hoping that I would just ‘forget’ and everything would be alright. They wouldn’t know that I wasn’t there.”

“Oh trust me, they would know and Misha would have your ass. Literally.” Jared didn’t miss the innuendo that laced Jensen’s voice. “Not that I blame him.” And at that Jared flushed all over.

Jared wanted to say something back, some kind of witty retort that would make Jensen blush just as hard as he was but his mind was blank. A moment passed and then another and finally Jensen just knocked his shoulder against Jared’s.

“Come on. I’ll stand out there with you. Gives me an excuse to not prep for the week.” And that was that.

They both dropped their stuff off in Jensen’s office and practically ran outside, coffee still in hand, to be at their post before the first bus rolled in. They barely made it in time. 

The other teacher who was supposed to be helping Jared made her annoyance very clear when she directed Jared to where he was going to be standing. She didn’t even look at Jensen, like he wasn’t even there and without actually saying the threat but most certainly made it sound like one, she told Jared that if he was late again, she was going to tell Mr. Collins and there were going to be repercussions.

Jensen just laughed like it was one of the funniest things that he’s ever heard and the teacher glared at him for a moment before turning around to face the first bus of the day.

Jared tried to stay mad at Jensen, it was his fault in the first place that he was late but he couldn’t. Not for very long. The moment the kids got off the bus, he instantly became this thing that seemed to attract light from every direction. It had only been a week since school had started and Jensen already had kids high-fiving him like he was their best friend; it wasn’t like Jared didn’t understand why. He was just the kind of dude that anyone would want to be friends with and Jared considered himself lucky that Jensen seemed to enjoy his company as much as he did.

“Hey Mr. P!” A voice shook him out of his thoughts. Jared blinked once, and with a horrified realization, he had been staring openly at Jensen this entire time.

“Hey, Timothy.” Jared replied, plastering on a smile and trying to pretend that he wasn’t caught staring. Besides, who was really paying that much attention to him anyway. It wasn’t like he was going to be called out on it and if anyone, any kid, tried to comment on it, he would just brush it off with a laugh and say nothing.

“See you during fourth.” Timothy said before he scurried off to join his friends who were waiting for him a few meters away.

“Mr. P, huh?” Another voice, the one that seemed to stay ever constant in his thoughts, said. “You trying to stay hip with the times?” Jensen had a dorky little smile on his face as he came back to stand next to Jared.

Jared laughed and shook his head. “First of all, never say ‘hip with the times’ ever again. It makes you sound like an old man. And second, as opposed to having these kids come up with their own pronunciation of my last name, I thought that it would just be easier for them to call me Mr. P. They seem to be okay with it.” And not to mention, it seemed like the kids seemed to like him a little more, like he wasn’t the stuck up, pretentious teacher that required his students to call him by his last name and correctly. He had enough of those teachers during his school career.

Jensen looked like he was going to say something else but then someone came up behind him, touching him softly on the shoulder to grab his attention. Jared recognized her. Ms. Walters, a part of the history department, taught world history if Jared remembered correctly.

She said something to Jensen in a voice quiet enough that Jared couldn’t hear exactly what was being said but he noticed the way that Jensen’s shoulders seemed to slump forward when she finished.

He turned back to Jared, a forced smile on his face but the frown was evident in his eyes.

“I’ve gotta go.” Jensen said. “I forgot that there was a department meeting this morning.” Then Jensen leaned in closer for a moment and in a much lower voice he said, “Trust me, I would much rather be out here. The shit that we’re gonna talk about could be put in a fucking email.”

Jared smiled at that because he knew it to be true. Many of the meetings that Jared had to attend before the school year started could have been explained in a very short email. There was no need for him to miss his lunch just to sit through an hour and a half meeting explaining how the grading system worked.

“Take notes. Be studious.” Jared said around a smile.

Jensen cuffed him on the shoulder. “Bite me.”

“You give me a chance and I just might.” The words just came from his mouth before Jared even really realized what he was saying and the moment that it registered in his brain, his mouth went dry and his heart started thudding in his chest.

Jared waited for the moment that the smile slipped from Jensen’s face and disgust replaced it. He waited for the moment that Jensen recoiled because he figured out the thoughts that ran through his mind. Yeah, back at the diner and afterwards, he might have been accepting of who Jared liked but that didn’t mean that he would be accepting of the fact that Jared was crushing after him. Hard. Hell, he was in a very committed relationship with a very beautiful girl.

And Jared knows that he’s only known Jensen for about a week and it was probably ridiculous to think that he might have some feelings for this man but his parents did always tell him that it only took a week for them to know that they wanted to be together for the rest of their lives.

However that smirk never faltered and Jared could have sworn that the corner of Jensen’s mouth quirked upward just a little more. Like, if Jared dared to think it, that Jensen was thinking about it.

“If only you’re so lucky, Padalecki.” A quick moment passed and Jared realized that Jensen was stalling.  Ms. Walters was standing off a little, looking at the two of them, arms crossed across her chest and her lips pressed into a thin line. She probably drew the short end of the stick to go and retrieve Jensen and she was not happy at all about it.

“You should go.” Jared said, keeping his hands in his pockets, careful not to touch Jensen for fear that he might wrap his fingers around Jensen’s wrist and keep him here, away from the meeting and most importantly, by his side. “You can’t prolong the meeting forever. The rest of the history department might come here with stakes and pitchforks, after your head.”

“Yeah.” Jensen glanced back at Ms. Walters and if looks could kill, Jensen would probably drop dead. “Time to go face the firing squad. See you at lunch?” He sounded hopeful, like Jared wasn’t already planning on eating lunch with him.

“Of course.”

“Great. See you later.” And with that, Jensen turned and followed Ms. Walters inside the building, neither one of them talking to each other, or even glancing over at one another. Still, Jensen stepped ahead and opened the door for her. Ever the gentleman and she gave him a curt nod.

The rest of the buses came and went without much preamble. It progressively got louder the more kids who stepped off the bus and joined their friends and Jared ushered the stranglers inside. He waved at the students who waved at him and gave out a couple of fist bumps to those who wanted it.

He kept glancing over at the other teacher, hoping to meet her eye and offer some kind of apology for being late but she made it very clear that she didn’t want his apology and wasn’t going to accept one if Jared gave one. He sighed and decided to cut his losses. He’s pissed off two people already on the second Monday of the school year. At this rate, by the end of the year, he was going to have everyone pissed at him, including Jensen.

The minutes drug on by and finally the first bell rang, signaling that he could return to his classroom. He was about to head off in the direction of the school when the other teacher tsked at him. He turned back to look at her.

“You think that you can show up late and then leave right as that bell rings?” She was standing right in front of him and she was tiny but her hands were on her hips and she was frowning and Jared felt like he was the smaller one. “There are still kids out here and  _ you _ need to make sure that they all get inside. Okay?"

“I’m… I’m sorry.” Jared said quickly. “I didn’t mean to be late. I was just…”

“Caught up in staring at that pretty boy teacher that you lost track of time?” Even though she posed it as a question, it didn’t sound like one and Jared felt himself blushing again. Was it really that obvious?

“Really, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to leave you out here alone and be late. I promise that I won’t be late again. I promise.” Jared tried to put as much sincerity in his voice as he could manage.

She kept staring up at him, her lips still pressed into a thin line before she finally dropped her hands, her face softening.

“You’re the new teacher they hired, right? The new english teacher?” The anger seemed to dissipate from her voice.

“Yeah.” He replied a little more sheepish than he wanted to sound. “I’m Jared.” He stuck out his hand.

Surprisingly she took it and shook his hand stronger than he expected. “Genevieve.” She said with a smile. “I teach Earth Science. All the way down in the basement. Forgotten in my own little world.”

Jared huffed out a laugh. “Must be nice. I have people in and out of my room all day. I guess they wanna make sure that I can actually teach even though they already hired me.”

“Naw. They’re probably just making sure the kids hadn’t smelled the fresh meat yet and devoured you. These kids are brutal sometimes. But then again, I love what I do so I can’t really complain.”

They fell into a comfortable silence, Genevieve standing closer to Jared now, with a small smile on her face. She seemed happier and seemed to have accepted Jared’s apology for being late which made him feel a little better but still there was a seed of guilt that settled in his stomach. It wasn’t fair to her that she was on time and because he wanted to sleep in and then got distracted by Jensen that he was late. He was going to figure something out to make it up to her. It was the least that he could do.

They urged the last few kids to get along inside the building and then the second bell rang, signaling the start of class. Jared and Genevieve looked at each other for a spilt second before running off to their respective parts of the building, she down and him up. There was no telling what kind of hell could be raised in his classroom if he was even just twenty seconds late.

Sweat had broken out at his hairline by the time that he reached the door to his classroom and to his surprise, everyone was in their seats, either talking to one another or on their phones. He took a deep breath, collected himself before he walked into the room. The last thing he wanted to look like was another kid late for class. He was the teacher goddamnit. He could be late if he wanted.

The moment that he walked into the room, twenty-two pairs of eyes landed on him, all of them with smiles on their faces, not one bit concerned with the fact that he was still sweating, slightly out of breath and obviously late.

“You painted your room, Mr. P!” Charles called out, pointing out the paint on the walls as if Jared didn’t see it, much less actually paint it himself. “It looks awesome.”

“Thank you.” Jared smiled as he walked around to his desk, just slightly distracted. He was looking for his bag with everyone’s papers in it, waiting to be passed back. “But I can’t take all the credit. Jen…” He caught himself. “Mr. Ackles came up here to help me with it so if you see him, be sure to thank him too.”

There were a few murmurs that filtered around the room that if Jared was actually paying attention he could have figured out what everyone was saying but his focus was trying to find his bag. He had it with him this morning. He knew that. Then he ran into Jensen in the parking lot, the coffee, the figuring out he was late to bus duty, the running to put his…

He groaned because of course. He left it in Jensen’s office, opting to put it in there instead just to save sometime. And now he was going to have to run down to the office to get it and come back.

Jared pinched the bridge of his nose before turning around to face the class. “Alright, so, I forgot my bag in the office.” He explained. “Give me two seconds and I’ll be right back.” He walked the length of the room in four easy strides, standing in the doorway before turning back. “Please, be good. Stay quiet, stay in the room. I will be right back.”

Then he shut the door and once he knew that no one could see him through the classroom window, he speed walked all the way to Jensen’s office, throwing open the door and walked inside. But his bag wasn’t there. It wasn’t on the table where he was sure that he placed it. Jensen’s bag was there but not his. He looked around the room once, twice before coming back around to stand in front of Jensen’s bag, chewing on the inside part of his cheek.

There was a chance, maybe, that Jensen’s meeting got out late and Jensen had to rush to class just like Jared did and accidentally picked up the wrong bag. There was no other explanation for why Jensen’s bag would still be there and not his. Unless, of course, someone, for whatever reason, broke into the office and stole Jared’s bag and only Jared’s bag.

The latter seemed less likely.

So he was going to have to make another unplanned detour. Not that it was a bad thing per se.

He walked, a little faster than normal, to Jensen’s classroom, Jensen’s bag in his hand. He took a moment to calm his breathing so it didn’t look like he ran all the way up here, once again, and knocked on the door.

One of the kids that sat near the door reached over and opened it for him without so much looking away from the sheet of paper that was on her desk.

Jared stepped into the room and his heart did this little stutter step thing as soon as his eyes landed on Jensen.

Jensen was seated at his desk in the back of the room, bent over some book. He was holding a pen that was resting on his bottom lip as he chewed at the tip of it. And the thing that really caused Jared to forget how to breath was the fact that he was wearing a pair of glasses. Never before had Jared put much thought into the idea that glasses could look that good on someone but here Jensen was, sporting some scruff that looked like it hadn’t been shaved in a couple of days, chewing on the end of a pen and wearing glasses.

Jared wasn’t sure what Jensen was doing to him but he was doing something and it wouldn’t turn out good. Jared was sure of it.

Jensen looked up and smiled around the pen when he saw Jared hovering in the doorway.

“Jared! What do I owe the pleasure?” He capped the pen and used it to mark his spot in the book and quickly took off his glasses, shoving them in his pocket. Jared could notice the tips of his ears turning pink once again at being caught wearing them.

Everyone in the room was now staring at the two of them.

There were a couple of kids in here that Jared had in some of his other classes.

“Um…” He swallowed dumbly. “You… I think you grabbed the wrong bag.” He held up Jensen’s bag as he said it. “I have yours.”

Jensen looked at the bag in Jared’s hand and then down beside his desk where Jared assumed his bag was. Jensen looked back up, faux confusion on his face and Jared knew, with that slight upturn of Jensen’s mouth, that it wasn’t a mistake at all.

“Hmm…” Jensen drawled out, taking his time to climb to his feet and walk over to where Jared was still hovering in the door. “I guess so. I was just in such a hurry since the meeting got out and I guess that I didn’t even notice that I grabbed your bag.”

He handed it back over to Jared, their fingers brushing against one another.

“Thanks for bringing this back to me. I’m not sure what I would do without it.” The bastard said with a cheeky grin and Jared could only nod in reply. “You still on for lunch?”

“Absolutely.” Jared answered immediately and almost instantly he felt himself blush all over. He was too quick to say anything, no hesitation, no nothing. It was like the word was on the tip of his tongue, waiting to just be blurted out.

Luckily, for Jared’s sanity, most of the kids turned back to their work and Jensen didn’t seem to notice the way that there was hardly a gap between his question and Jared’s answer. Then, just because Jensen was still standing in front of him with no intent of sitting back down, he asked how the meeting went. Jensen said that he was right, the meeting was nothing more than an over glorified email and that he was pretty sure everyone in the history department was already out for his blood and it was only the second week of school. There wasn’t a smile to be seen when Jensen mentioned that.

Later, at lunch, when they had time to talk and when there weren’t any ears around, Jared was going to ask about that, about the animosity between Jensen and the rest of the history department. It felt bigger than just the fact that he got the department head position right after he started working for the school.

“I really have to get back.” Jared reluctantly said when he glanced down at his watch and notice that he had been gone for close to ten minutes. It hadn’t been ten quite yet but he was nearing it.

Jensen chuckled. “There’s no telling what they’ve done to that room of yours now. We might have to repaint it this weekend.”

“Ha. I hope not. I would like to have a weekend to do absolutely nothing.” Jared said backing out of the room.

Jensen followed, keeping a hand on the door. “If you need help wrangling in those hellions, feel free to call me. I’m not afraid to help.” Jensen said and then when Jared was finally out into the hall and turned away, he shut the door.

When Jared finally got back to his room, he still felt flushed all over but nothing seemed to be out of order to the room which Jared was grateful for. Everyone was still in their seats, talking amongst themselves. A few of them watched as Jared walked back to his desk and collapsed into his seat, letting out a huge puff of breath.

He gave himself a minute to collect his thoughts but even then, they were still scattered all over the place.

The class started to get a little more restless the longer that Jared sat at his desk, a little louder as time passed and Jared decided that he wasn’t going to get anything productive done in the first period. Besides, it was the second Monday of school and he knew that the kids were probably exhausted as it was. A full week of work when they were used to two months of doing nothing. So honestly Jared would be doing them a favor not doing anything for the day.

He walked around to the front of the room and everyone got quiet quickly, all the eyes trained on him.

“So, about that summer reading assignment that y’all are supposed to have for me.” Jared started, keeping the smile of his face when he say the panicked looks fall across the room. Already he could see the minds working of kids saying that they didn’t know about the reading or the assignment. “I know that all of y’all totally did every single last thing that you were supposed to do but I thought, just for the heck of it, that I would give you the opportunity to go over it today in class.”

There were several audible exhales of breath.

He watched as people reached into their bags and pulled out  _ Wuthering Heights _ and a sheet of paper. It was a godawful book with godawful people if you asked him but he wasn’t in charge of making the reading list nor did he have any say in the matter of what was supposed to be read. So he bit his tongue and was going to teach the lesson, as quickly as he could.

“For those of you who forgot to bring their book today, there are extra copies over there on the shelf. You can help yourself to a copy today but I do expect that you always have a copy of the book we’re reading with you everyday for the rest of the year. There is no telling when I will be doing annotation checks or something like that.” Jared said returning back to his desk.

“Annotations? You’re going to be checking annotations?” Charles asked. More like blurted out, the whine evident in his voice.

“I don’t know what I’ll be doing.” Jared answered truthfully. “But it will be beneficial to you to have them done. You may not think that the points will help your grade but it will most certainly affect your grade if you don’t have them done.”

Quite honestly, Jared wasn’t sure if he was ever going to check for annotations but it was one of the things that he was told by the other teachers in the english department that he needed to do. In his experience, kids never really annotated the way that they needed to. For the most part, it was just sarcastic comments and sentences underlined randomly. It never did help contribute to the understanding of the reading but still Jared agreed, said that he would check every once in a while.

“What kind of annotations are you going to be looking for, Mr. P?” Amy chimed in, her copy of the book in her hand, looking concerned. She had already flipped through the book twice in the time that she asked the question.

“I don’t expect every page to be marked up. I am just looking for that you are responding to the reading, that you are underlying words that you don’t know or are asking questions that you don’t know. Things that could potentially be used when we have class discussions. I’m not so much looking for the metaphors that lace the book or the personification or whatever else your previous teachers told you that you always needed to look for.”

There was a confused look that crossed the room and Jared sighed again.

For so many years they were taught that books only derive meaning from the metaphors and similes and the symbols. Hell, he remembers back when he was in school and every little thing was supposed to be a symbol. It wasn’t until he got to college and later when he did some masters work that he learned that those things weren’t as important as his high school teachers lead him to believe.

“Okay listen.” He had everyone’s attention. “What I’m looking for when you read and we talk about the work is that you understand it. A lot of literature and especially a lot of the stuff that we’re going to be reading this year is going to be difficult to grasp. There are thoughts and ideas and arguments posed throughout the work that I want you to pick up on. I’m more interested that you realize that  _ Paradise Lost _ is a complicated argument explaining the reason why things are the way they are and that everyone has their place in the order of the world. I don’t really want to know what all the symbols are within the essay. Does that make sense?”

There were some tentative nods.

“When you take this test in the spring, the AP graders aren’t really going to care that you’re able to say that the conch shell from  _ Lord of the Flies _ represent power and order, they’re going to be more interested in your ability to read and analyze a piece of fiction and formulate some sort of articulate response, no matter what that may be.”

There were still confused looks.

“The number one thing that you need to remember throughout this entire class is that there is no one correct answer to anything. We were not there with Milton or Shelly or Brontë when they wrote what they did and so we can’t know exactly what they were meaning when they put words to paper. Your interpretation might and most likely will be different than mine and it doesn’t mean that either one of us is right and the other is wrong, it just means that we read the piece differently. My goal is to teach you how to define your opinion.”

The silence in the room was deafening and Jared was sure that he broke some of the minds of the students. They probably never heard in their lives that he didn’t care about what their opinion was as long as they could formulate a well thought out response.

“Now when I give you a reading quiz and what not and I ask you directly what color the ball was, I do want the correct answer. If the ball was red, then it is red and you can’t convince me that it was green. Alright?” Jared said with a light chuckle.

Smiles broke out on the faces of his students and he prepared himself to say this speech again for the rest of his classes.

“Now, get to work. Today is going to be the only day that you will have in class to work on the assignment. It’s due at the beginning of class on Friday. Oh and for those of y’all who have forgotten the specific questions, there’s copies of the assignment on the shelf by the whiteboard.”

With that, he was done. He pulled out the essays, running through them real quick to make sure that he didn’t miss grading one. While the kids were working on the summer assignment, he passed out the essays quietly.

First period went by quickly and after explaining his expectations to second period, it was lunch time before he knew it.

Everyone rushed to lunch, eager to get out of the classroom and to their friends. Jared lingered by his desk for a couple of minutes, saying thank you to the kids that complimented his classroom and answered any questions about the summer assignment before he grabbed his bag and made his way to Jensen’s office.

If he walked the whole way there with his head down and looked like he was a man on a mission then they wouldn’t be wrong per se.

He just didn’t want to be stopped and have to engage in conversation with anyone.

Jensen was already seated in his spot by the time that Jared got there and the smile that spread across Jensen’s features was about damn near infectious. Jared couldn’t help but return the smile as he sat down across from Jensen.

Jared let out an exasperated sigh and ran a hand through his hair.

“I swear man, these teachers aren’t preparing these kids for college, like at all and filling their heads with the wrong things that they should be focusing on. If I have to read one more essay explaining how spring represents rebirth and youth, I am jumping off the building.”

“Well, good to see you too Jared.” Jensen said through a smile.

Jared narrowed his eyes and glared at Jensen. “Oh, don’t think that you have nothing to do with this.” Jared said as he gestured to the lines on his forehead that he was fearful would become permanent by the end of the year.

“What did I do?” Jensen exclaimed.

“Oh, you know what you did, you bag thief. You had me running all over this building looking for my bag this morning. That made me sweat more than I needed to sweat.”

“I told you, I accidentally grabbed the wrong bag. I didn’t even realize it was yours until you showed up in my classroom with  _ my _ bag in your hand.” Jensen tried to explain, again, but there was a gleam in his eye that told Jared that it was nothing more than a lie.

“They look nothing alike!”

There was a moment where it looked like Jensen was going to keep up the lie, try to convince Jared that he really did accidentally grab the wrong bag but then he dropped the look of innocence and shook his head.

“Alright. Okay. You caught me. I’m guilty.” He held his hands as if to surrender. “Yeah, okay, I took your bag on purpose.” Jared was about to cut in but Jensen bet him to it. “But! It was only because I wanted to see how long it would take you to figure out that I was the one that had your bag.”

“You asshole. For a moment I thought that someone had stolen my bag. I have some really important stuff in there.”

“Oh yeah.” Jensen countered. “Besides essay’s, what could you possibly have in there that had you freaking out so much?”

As dramatically as he could, Jared reached into his bag and pulled out a container holding it in front of Jensen. “My mother stopped by this weekend and she had baked me some chocolate chip cookies of which I was going to share with you but since you obviously don’t think that chocolate chip cookies are important, I’m not going to share them with you anymore.” Jared said, slowly putting the container back into his bag.

“Oh no, Padalecki.” Jensen said quickly, reaching across the table and snagging the container away from Jared. “Don’t you joke about keeping a man away from his dessert. That’s a dangerous game to be playing.”

“Mhmm.” Jared hummed, leaning back in his seat, happy. Leave it to Jensen to make the stress disappear and make him feel better.

Jensen didn’t even wait to finish his sandwich before biting into one of the cookies.

“Oh god.” Jensen mumbled around the bite. “I am going to marry your mother. These are honestly the best.”

“Well, she’s happily married to my dad so I don’t think that’s going to happen but I can tell you that you enjoyed them.”

“Yes. Please do.” Jensen shoved the rest of the cookie into his mouth.

He then wiped his hands on his jeans before returning to eat his sandwich, proclaiming that he was going to wait to finish the cookies until after he finished his lunch.

Jared took out his lunch and started to eat on it all the while debating about whether or not he should ask Jensen about the whole thing with the history department but he looked happy and the last thing that Jared wanted to do was get rid of that smile. So he decided to wait, let it come up naturally in a conversation as opposed to just springing it on Jensen out of the blue.

They ate in a comfortable silence, not needing to talk, just happy with the company when there was a knock on the door and a second later it opened.

Jensen lifted his head from the newspaper that he was reading (catching up on the sports) and he smiled so wide when he saw who it was.

“Danneel!” He said, popping up out of his chair and met her halfway across the room to wrap his arm around her back and she popped up on her toes to give him a kick kiss. Immediately the happy feeling that had settled in Jared’s stomach disappeared, replacing with something that he could only call jealousy.

She hugged him back with one arm before she pulled away.

“What are you doing here? Have a seat. Relax.” Jensen asked, holding her hand as he walked back to his seat. She followed along but didn’t sit in the empty seat next to Jensen.

“I can’t stay for long. I’m only popping in for a moment to bring you something sweet to eat. Thought that you might need it to get through the rest of the day.” She said, handing Jensen the paper bag that she had been holding.

Jensen let go of her hand and looked inside of the bag, grinning widely before setting it down on the table.

He looked up at her and then back across the table at Jared and it was like Jensen just realized that Jared was still sitting there. Again, Jared’s stomach twisted into an angry pit of jealousy that he couldn’t help but feel. The moment that she walked in here, Jared seemed to disappear.

“Danni, this is Jared.” Jensen introduced them, keeping his eyes on Jared as he said so but he was frowning ever so slightly, like he could tell that there was something off about Jared.

“So, you’re the guy that he just won’t shut up about.” Danneel said as she walked around the table and didn’t even hesitate to give Jared a hug. Jared awkwardly stood up halfway, hugging her back and yeah, he could see why Jensen was head over heels in love with this girl. The way that he was now grinning like an idiot spoke to that. “Like all I ever hear about is ‘Jared this’ and ‘Jared that’. I don’t know what you did to my boyfriend but you can keep him.”

Jared shot a look over at Jensen and Jensen just shrugged.

“I don’t talk about you  _ all _ the time.” He tried to defend himself.

“Yes. Yes you do.” Danneel shot back. “I really hate to do this but I have to duck out. I have a deadline due for this latest article and the editor wants to meet before it’s sent to the publishing house.” She walked back over to Jensen and bent down to give Jensen one last kiss. Jensen craned his neck upwards to meet her in the middle. “It was really nice to put such a lovely face to the name, Jared. Hopefully in the future we can actually hang out.”

“Yes.” Jared nodded. “Likewise.”

She ruffled her hand through Jensen’s hair before leaving in a whirlwind of color and smiles. As soon as she turned her back, Jensen had both his hands in his hair, fixing it the best he could with an annoyed but fond look on his face, like it wasn’t the first time she did that and it most certainly wouldn’t be the last.

“So… She seems really nice.” Jared said clearing his throat after a moment.

“She’s crazy.” Jensen admitted, turning in his chair to face Jared fully again. “But then again, I guess that you have to be crazy to put up with me so I can’t complain. I’m just lucky that she’s stuck with me so long.”

“How long have y’all been together?” The words tasted bitter in Jared’s mouth. He took a bite of his sandwich, hoping that it would get rid of the taste when in reality it did nothing but feel like he swallowed a wad of cotton.

“Oh geez, forever it seems. I met her in undergrad. We had freshman college algebra together. I was failing. She wasn’t. I went to the professor for some help and he told me to go ask her for help and the rest is history, I guess.” Jensen rubbed the back of his neck in as a nervous tick.

Jared didn’t know what to say so he didn’t say anything. But he watched with some satisfaction as Jensen pushed the bag that Danneel brought him over to the side a little more to reach for the container of cookies.

“She writes for a fashion magazine that’s local here. It’s actually pretty popular. She loves it too. It’s where she gets all of her ideas for her outfits.” Jensen went on to explain around another mouthful of cookie. “So yeah, we’ve been together forever. And I’m telling you, it’s a wonder that she hasn’t left me yet. You would think that she would find some better guy out there than me.”

“Oh, I don’t think so.” Jared said, something pulling tight in his chest at the thought that Jensen thinks that he doesn’t deserve someone like her. Even though he’s only met her for two seconds, she seems amazing and they looked perfect together. “If you ask me anyone would be lucky to have you.”

A moment passed and then two and once again Jared felt like he swallowed cotton balls because he totally didn’t just say that to Jensen. Except the way that Jensen was staring at the grain of the wood on the table told Jared all he needed to know.

“I didn’t… I didn’t mean anything by it.” Jared spoke quickly. “I was just saying that… I… I don’t even know.” He admitted. “I was just speaking, I guess.”

Jensen looked up from the table and at Jared through his eyelashes.

“Naw, hey, it’s no big deal. Alright. It’s just…” Jensen shrugged. “She’s been with me through a lot of shit. Shit that she shouldn’t have to put up with and I just feel like… I don’t know… she deserves someone who doesn’t carry around a ton of baggage. I just keep waiting for the day that she wakes up and realizes that she wasted the last seven years of her life with me.”

Another stretch of silence and they both weren’t looking at each other anymore. Then Jensen chuckled, something dark and without humor but it broke the silence and Jared forced his gaze back to his co-worker.

“Shit, man. I didn’t mean to drop that on you. Don’t know where the hell that came from.” He still wasn’t quite meeting Jared’s gaze but at least he was looking at his face and that was better than nothing. “She’s a great girl and I’m lucky to have her and I’m grateful for every second that I do have.” Another pause. “There’s cookies are really good. Is it like a family recipe or something?”

It was obvious that Jensen wanted to change the conversation and Jared was glad for the out. He wasn’t sure how he was going to make Jensen realize that anyone would be lucky to have him without professing everything that he felt which would be a real stupid thing to do.

It was only the second week of school.

There was no need to be stupid just yet.

So he took Jensen’s out and started talking about the cookies, that yes, they were a family recipe and if Jared were to give over said family recipe, he was going to have to kill him. That was just the way it was. Then after Jared killed him, his mom would kill him for giving out the recipe in the first place. Stuff like that was protected more than the nuclear codes. That brought a smile to Jensen’s face and Jared was happy to see it. It needed to stay there for as long as Jared could possibly keep it there.

Lunch came and went and when the bell rang for third period to start, they both gathered their things to head to their rooms.

Jared couldn’t help but notice that Jensen had eaten all the cookies that he had brought him and put the dessert in the fridge that Danneel brought him. It could be nothing more than the fact that Jensen didn’t want to eat so much sugar in one sitting but it still made Jared’s chest fill with pride, that Jensen wanted what he brought more than what his girlfriend brought him.

His third period was more than happy to have a day to work on the summer assignment. More than once he answered questions about the reading for those who came to his desk and it was very clear to pick out the kids that read and who didn’t read.

He didn’t blame them though. Even when he was in school, he could hardly get through the book.

So he helped when he could, directed the kids to the pages that they needed to check out to help with their questions and for the kids that were truly clueless, he told them that he was going to stay after school tomorrow to help anyone with anything that they really needed help with. Not that he was going to give them the direct answers, it was just, he was going to give them a little more help than he probably should give them given that they had an entire summer to read the book and complete the assignment.

Besides, the internet was out there and the school has used this same assignment for the last few years and Jared wasn’t stupid. He knew that someone somewhere posted the answers online. All it would take would be some quick typing and a google search.

He quickly made things up with Genevieve. After figuring out where her classroom was, he brought her a small bouquet of flowers during his off fourth period. He told her that they were flowers that meant his sincerest apologies and with a roll of her eyes, she took them. She shuffled through her supply closet before she could find something that she could put the flowers in and she planted them in the middle of her desk.

“Just so you know, I’m gonna hate you again as soon as these flowers die.” She joked.

“Well, I suppose that I should just keep bringing you flowers then.” Jared replied.

“I guess you should.”

He did. When Genevieve alluded to the fact that the flowers were starting to die one morning before school, Jared knew that he was going to swing by the store the next morning to pick her up another bouquet. He knew that they had let bygones be bygones and she no longer held a grudge against him for being late that one morning but it took $15 dollars to bring a smile to her face and he found that there weren’t nearly enough smiles in the building.

Jensen noticed the flowers in his hand the next morning and nudged him.

“Those for me?” Jensen teased, battering his eyelashes and Jared pushed him away.

“No. I would never buy your lame ass flowers.” Jared said.

“Yeah, you’re right. I’m more of a champagne and diamond ring kinda girl.” Jensen battered his eyelashes again, puckering his lips like he was waiting for a kiss.

Jared placed his hand in the middle of Jensen’s face and pushed him away again. “Shut up. These are for Genevieve. I’m trying to do something nice since she hates my guts because  _ you _ made me late that one morning.”

“And you think giving her flowers will do that?” The playfulness of his voice was gone.

“She liked the first bouquet that I got her.”

“You already bought her flowers?” The smile was gone.

“Yeah.”

“Oh.” Jensen muttered in reply and for a moment he walked in silence next to Jared, looking at the ground. “She’s a nice girl, huh?”

“Yeah. I mean, I like her. She’s pretty funny and just scary enough that I don’t wanna get on her bad side.” Jared replied before something clicked inside his brain. “I’m not trying to woo her!” He exclaimed.

“I never said you were.”

“No but that’s what the tone of your voice was saying. Dude, yeah, she’s cute and all and sure, I wouldn’t mind dating her or whatever if she wanted that but I already told you, I prefer guys a little more no matter how cute or nice she is.” He held up the flowers. “These are just because she said that she liked the flowers I brought her when I apologized for being late and I thought it would be nice to bring her another bouquet. Don’t worry. I’m not going to date my co-worker.”

“Hmm.” Was all Jensen said. 

That morning he didn’t walk with Jared all the way to the buses. Instead he said good-bye and walked into the building under the pretense that he had some copies that needed to be made before the morning started.

At lunch, he seemed fine but Jared made sure not to mention the way that Genevieve squealed when Jared presented her with the flowers. He thought it would be best.

Before he knew it, a month of school had passed already and it only felt like he had blinked. Everyday he ate in Jensen’s office, falling into a familiar pattern with him. One weekend they went out for lunch and ended up talking until well into the evening and the waitress said through a forced smile that they were going to have to leave unless they wanted to buy dinner also.

They left the restaurant laughing, not realizing that they had been there for so long.

Things were good between the two of them and Jared almost couldn’t believe how easily he made a friend. He excepted to stay inside his classroom for the entire year, teach and that would be it. He would have never imagined that he would come across someone like Jensen.

He couldn’t complain about anything. Even though he was annoyed at first that the kids seemed to be behind, they were picking things up quickly. He had a couple drop within the second week of school but he didn’t take it personal. He knew that the class was hard and after they saw how much not turning in the summer reading assignment would drop their grade, they learned real quick that maybe they wanted to take something just slightly different.

There were two kinds of high school seniors. Those who came to school and put in the work because they knew they had no choice in the matter and those who came to school who didn’t care anymore. There was no in between.

With that being said, it was exhausting work. He started spending more days after school to help with anyone who needed help and that often meant that he didn’t leave school until six, seven, eight at night.

The first time that Jensen heard that Jared was leaving so late, he was horrified that Jared was leaving at night, so far into the dark. It wasn’t that they were in a bad neighborhood per se but the school was right on that line.

In the day, it was perfectly fine but at night, that was when trouble started to happen. There were instances of teachers being jumped on their way to their car. They were few and far between but still it made Jensen worry. Never mind the fact that Jared was 6’4”, made of pure muscle and wasn’t scared of scuffing his knuckles, Jensen insisted on waiting with Jared until he left school.

So sleep was important to him. Very important. When he wasn’t grading or texting with Jensen or catching up on football or taking the dogs on one of their long overdue walks, he was sleeping.

Sunday nights were usually the nights that he turned in early and passed out like a rock.

So when his phone beeped at him, signaling that he had gotten a text, he was a little more than frustrated. 

He frowned, looking over at the alarm clock. It was a little past eleven and all his friends knew by now that on a school nights he went to bed early. If they wanted to get in touch with him, they needed to text him at six in the evening, when he was eating dinner because by nine, he was already in bed, preparing for the next day.

There was another insistent bing from his phone, signaling yet another text and Jared groaned as he reached over to his night stand to grab the phone.

Whoever the fuck just woke him up was going to get a very stern message in reply that he was pleasantly asleep and they were going to have to watch out for rattlesnakes in their mail for the next six months.

Except all the anger and frustration seemed to disappear immediately whenever he saw that it was Jensen that was the one who had texted him.

And it seemed as if Jensen had sent him a link to a YouTube video.

_ you’ve gotta watch this!!! _

_ it’s fucking hilarious _

With some hesitation Jared opened the link to the video, mind still in that fog of sleep and confusion as to why Jensen might be texting him in the middle of the night a link to a video.

Before he pressed play, he sent Jensen back a text.

_ wtf man? you should be asleep. why are you texting me at midnight??? _

It took all of two seconds for a reply.

_ it’s eleven not midnight. _

_ just watch the video. i promise it’ll be worth it. _

Jared rolled his eyes but there was a smile creeping to his lips that he couldn’t keep off.

_ if i’m exhausted tomorrow i’m blaming you asshole _

Jensen just sent a winky face in reply and it had Jared’s stomach doing a flip.

Going back to the video, he pressed play and despite the fact that there was still the annoyance of being woken up lingering in the back of his mind, he pressed play against his better judgement. But hell, if Jensen was sending him something, it was probably something he should watch.

The moment that he saw it was Key and Peele knew that by the end of the video he was going to be in tears from laughing and like he thought, he was. The video was his everyday struggle of having to pronounce names on his roster and the reaction from the substitute teacher was exactly how he felt inside. He watched it again for good measure before texting back Jensen.

_ oh god. that was fucking amazing _ .

Jared hardly had to wait for a reply.

_ i know right!!! _

_ i’ve seen it about a million times now. _

And that was how Jared was lost to the night texting Jensen. He didn’t mean to stay up all night texting him, it just happened and it was effortless. He hardly had to wait for any kind of reply from Jensen, mere seconds and he watched the video another twelve times it seemed, laughing every time. It didn’t get any less funny.

He finally slipped into sleep with a smile on his face in the early hours of the morning, laughter still bubbling in his chest.

When his alarm finally went off the next morning, it felt like he hardly had any sleep at all. He wanted to hit snooze, sleep for another ten minutes but Harley and Sadie were already adjusted to this new schedule and they jumped up on Jared’s bed, licking him in the face, eager to go outside. For the simple fact that he didn’t want to clean up any mess the dogs made, he crawled out of bed and let the dogs out.

The shower he took was cold and woke him up just enough that he knew that he wouldn’t die by passing out at the wheel on the way to school.

Like always, Jensen was sitting on the bumper of his car, those two cups of coffee in his hand.

Jensen looked just as tired as he did Jared noticed with some smug satisfaction. Serves the fucker right for texting him that late in the night and then proceeded to keep him up.

“I hate you.” Was the first thing Jared said as he rested against the bumper next to Jensen.

Jensen knocked their shoulders together and handed Jared over his coffee. “Naw, I don’t think you do.”

“You keep me up again all night and Imma kill you. Understand?” Jared threatened.

Jensen just laughed. He threw his head back and laughed and Jared was entranced. He always was when Jensen laughed like this. Full and happy. “Naw, I don’t think you would do that either. You’d miss me too much.”

“I’ll show you just how much I’ll miss you.” Jared said and then he started walking towards the building.

It took all of two seconds for Jensen to push off the car and meet Jared’s stride, nestling right up next to him. The brush of their arms was something comforting, familiar now.

“That’s cold, Padalecki.”

“Mhmm.” Jared replied back around the lip of his coffee cup.

Then all the sudden Jensen jerked the coffee back, a little slipping on Jared and like the second grader that he was, he actually started running off with he. He turned around, running backwards, looking at Jared with a shit eating grin on his face.

“Hey!” Jared exclaimed. “That was mine!”

“Not anymore. People who want to kill me don’t get my coffee. Sorry but them’s the rules, Padalecki.”

Jared chased Jensen all the way to the front of the school where the buses still weren’t in yet and when he came to a stop in front of him, he held out his hand, gesturing towards the coffee. Jensen maintained eye contact as he took a huge sip from the cup before handing it back to Jared. A shiver ran up Jared’s spine and it had nothing to do with the slight breeze in the air.

“Have fun with bus duty.” Jensen said as he turned on his heel and walked towards the school.

“Jackass!” Jared yelled back.

Jensen just shot him a smile over his shoulder and winked before he disappeared inside the building.

Jared found himself smiling for the rest of the morning, not even caring when a group of kids who were more preoccupied with talking to each other than watching where they were going ran right into him and made him spill the rest of his coffee on his shirt. It was okay though, he had a spare shirt in the back of his car.

As soon as the first bell rang, he told Gen that he was going to change real quick and that he was going to see her bright and early tomorrow morning.

She could only laugh as she watched him navigate the maze of children as he ran towards the parking lot.

It was an old band t-shirt that he’s had since college, a little more casual than what he normally wore to teach but if anyone questioned him on it, he would say that he had coffee spilled all over him. What did they want him to do? Wear a coffee stained shirt all day? They seemed even less professional than wearing a t-shirt.

It happened to be one of the first things that Jensen commented on when he walked in for lunch.

“You changed.” Jensen said, his head popping up as Jared entered into the room.

Jared glanced down at his shirt and then back up at Jensen as he sat down in his seat. “Umm… yeah. Some kid ran into me while they were coming inside this morning and spilled my drink on me.” Jared explained as he reached into his bag to pull out his lunch. 

When he sat back upright, Jensen was still staring at him. Jared frowned, furrowing his brow a little bit. He looked down at his shirt to check to see if there was a stain on this shirt too but there was nothing there.

“Everything alright?” Jared asked.

Jensen shook his head, just slightly as if to clear his mind and he blinked a couple of times. It took him a moment to actually meet Jared’s gaze.

“Yeah.” He swallowed. “Yeah, everything’s good. It’s just… the shirt… it looks good on you.” He rushed the words out.

Jared’s heart jumped.

“Oh… umm… thank you.”

They both fell into silence, neither one of them really sure what to say anymore and it was something that Jared hadn’t experienced yet in the past month of hanging out with Jensen. They always seemed to know the right things to say or when they weren’t talking, it was comfortable, like they both knew that they needed need words to fill the void. But here, it felt like there was something lingering in the air, waiting to be ignited.

Jared was also certain that Jensen was staring at him more than usual, his gaze settling on the way that Jared seemed to fill out the shirt. 

Something hot made it’s way in Jared’s blood and all he could think about was the way that Jensen seemed to keep licking his lips, looking at Jared like he was something to be devoured.

It was bad.

Jared felt like if he continued to look at Jensen, watch the way that he would bite his lip, then Jared knew that he was going to do something stupid. Like reach across the table and do something that he would regret.

It was just a harmless crush. Something that would pass with time. Jensen was good looking and it had been a while since he’s been with anyone and he was thinking more with his dick than his brain. It would completely ruin everything that they had, the friendship.

A harmless crush.

The rest of the day seemed to pass impossibly slow. When the bell rang for lunch to be over, they both popped to their feet as if on a spring. They said their haste good-byes and went towards their room. Class itself felt like it was moving as slow as it possibly could. Every time he looked up at the clock, it seemed to be five minutes before the last time he looked at it.

The bell couldn’t ring fast enough and he was out the door with the kids, right on their heels.

He had decided, at lunch, that he was going to go out to the bar, get drunk, pick someone up and get whatever this itch that was right underneath his skin out. It was probably a bad idea, a really bad idea being that it was a Monday night and nothing good came out of a bar on a Monday night but he knew that he would get what he was looking for.

That was the only good thing about bars on a weekday. The people there weren’t looking for something long term, just something to last through the night.

When he got home, he hopped in the shower, washed his body, his hair, made sure he was something that people would want. He picked out a deep blue shirt and pulled on a pair of his tighter jeans and sprayed on some cologne that he never wore except for times like these. He waited until he was an acceptable hour to actually hit up the bar. At least as acceptable as it would be on a Monday night.

The place was busier than he figured it would be and he wasn’t complaining about that either. Nor was he picky about who would pick him up. Man, woman, anyone would make him happy. He just needed someone.

He got up to the bar, ordered a beer, knowing that he would probably get something a little stronger a little later in the night and rested his elbow against the surface of the bar top, angling his body towards the open floor and trying to look as available as he could make himself seem. He didn’t want to make a sign and tape it to the front of his shirt that said  _ take me home _ but he wasn’t below doing that. It would most certainly make this easier. At least he thought it would. Might attract the wrong kind of crowd but hey, it would be somebody.

He finished his first beer and when the bartender came back around, he asked if Jared wanted another and Jared nodded. One more beer and then he would probably hit the hard stuff.

The second beer was finished and still no one came up to him, started a conversation with him and Jared frowned at the ground. There were more than enough people here, most of them looked single or at least they had taken off their wedding band and Jared knew he didn’t want to fuck around with that but still, no one came up to him.

Then he had a third beer, the drink settling heavy in his stomach. He pushed away from the bar and headed towards the bathroom, hoping that just maybe someone he passed might want to strike up some kind of conversation with him.

He had no such luck.

When he returned to his spot at the bar, the bartender had dropped glass of whiskey on the counter before Jared could even ask for it and Jared looked down at it, brow furrowed slightly.

“On the house.” The bartender said, slinging the rag off his shoulder to dry some of the glasses that he had just finished washing. “You look like you need it.”

Jared frowned even more, picking up the drink and shooting it back without thinking too much about it. He already felt warm around the edges from the beer. “I look that desperate, huh?” He asked bitterly.

The bartender chuckled and stepped over so that he was standing directly in front of Jared.

“Now, that’s not what I said, is it?” He took the glass back and filled it up, pushing it back to Jared. Jared took it cautiously, turning to face the bartender, his back towards the rest of the crowd. “I just said you look like a man who needed a strong drink so here. A good strong drink.”

“Well… thanks.” Jared replied, his tone sharper than he meant for it to sound.

“You waiting on somebody?” The bartender asked after a moment of looking at the sad sap in front of him. 

Jared was circling the rim of the glass with his index finger, staring into it, debating about whether he should just cut his losses now and head home or if he should stick it out a little longer. It was already close to nine and yeah, Jared might be a little desperate but he wasn’t stupid. There was still school tomorrow and he would rather not show up to bus duty hungover. Nor did he want to teach hungover.

He choked out a curt laugh. “Ha, I wish but no. My dumbass thought that it would be a good idea to come to a bar on a Monday night in hopes that I might just get lucky but…” Jared gestured around him. “As you can see there’s no one around and it looks like the only thing that I’m going to score is a cab ride home.”

“That is a damn shame, if you ask me.” The bartender said and Jared blinked, once, twice, trying to decide if the bartender was really hitting on him or if he was drunker than he thought. The bartender stuck out his hand. “I’m Ryan.”

“Jared.” He replied, taking Ryan’s hand.

Ryan had a firm grip and an easy smile and Jared was suddenly weak in the knees.

“If you don’t mind me being so forward, Jared…” His name seemed to roll off the guys tongue and yep, Jared was just a little bit drunk. “But why is a guy like you out here looking for someone to pick up? Usually the only people I serve on a Monday night are the regulars and the sleaze balls who think that they’re actually something someone would want to go home with sober.”

Jared laughed because that was probably true and when he glanced around the room, without trying to sound conceited, he was one of the best dressed and one of the better looking people who was in the bar. He down his second drink before answering.

“The only reason why I’m here is because I think that I’m so dick hungry right now that I’m thirsting over my co-workers dick. Who, get this, is completely straight and is in a very committed relationship with a very beautiful girl.” Jared said, letting the alcohol not censor anything.

Ryan just stared at him for a moment and Jared didn’t have it in him to be embarrassed by what he said. The truth was the truth and there was no way to hide it.

“Well…” The guy drawled out. “I don’t know what your schedule is for the rest of the night but I can close up early and well, I guess I could try to help with that problem you have there.”

Jared almost couldn’t believe his luck. He said yes quicker than he shot back the second drink.

Another took it’s place.

The guy, like he said, closed up early, much to the dismay of the other patrons and to say that Jared was impatient was an understatement. As soon as everyone left the bar, Jared had his hands in the front of the guys shirt, pulling him in for a kiss. If he closed his eyes and didn’t think too much about it, he could almost imagine that it was Jensen that he was kissing.

Which was the number one thing that he didn’t want to think about. This was supposed to get Jensen out of his mind and granted, Ryan was an amazing kisser but it only made Jared’s mind wander and wonder what Jensen would kiss like if he was kissing him instead.

Jared pulled away and wiped a hand down his face. “You mind pouring me another shot of Jack before you close up completely?” Jared asked, warm all over.

“You still thinking of that co-worker of yours?” Ryan asked, amused.

“Unfortunately.”

Ryan just shook his head but turned to fill Jared up another glass of whiskey which Jared downed in two seconds flat. The only thing that kept Jared from completely feeling Ryan up in the middle of the bar was the fact that there was a bar top between the two of them and the fact that Ryan planted a hand in the middle of Jared’s chest and told him to wait, like a child.

And Jared did.

He planted himself on one of the bar stools, the one directly in front of Ryan and watched as he counted the drawer, occasionally letting whatever filth that popped up into his head spill from his lips which had Ryan pause and restart counting.

The rational and semi-sober part of Jared’s brain knew that this was going to be a really bad idea come the morning. He was acting like he had the entire weekend to recover from this stupid stunt when really he knew that he would only have a few hours but Ryan was offering and Jared couldn’t deny.

So he told that semi-sober part of his brain to shut the hell up, let Ryan take him home, pretend that it’s Jensen and then everything would be okay. He wouldn’t have those awful thoughts about his co-worker any longer.

It was flawless logic.

At least it was to a drunk.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity to Jared, Ryan finally closed the drawer, dropped the dirty towels in a basket to be taken care of in the morning and followed Ryan out the door. When they got to Ryan’s car, Jared pinned him against the drivers side door and made out with him, not caring who would see.

“Okay, okay.” Ryan said breathless, pulling his head back just far enough to breathe. “Two things, if you wanna get fucked on a bed as opposed to against a building, you need to stop and let me get in the car and drive back to my place. And second, if you pass out drunk in the middle of sex, I am never going to serve you another drink again.”

Jared blinked, letting everything that Ryan said filter through his head and then he nodded.

“Yep. Got it. Let you drive. Don’t pass out. More alcohol.” Jared repeated back. He stared at Ryan for just a moment longer before walking around the car and got in the passenger side, his brain working slower than normal.

That night, Jared didn’t get to sleep until close to three in the morning, wonderfully sore and exhausted. He only thought of Jensen a minimum of a million times throughout the night and he knew that there would be hell to pay in the morning. But he couldn’t care less. Ryan gave him what he wanted and it was perfect so he wasn’t complaining.

His alarm went off at seven a.m. sharp, right on time and he didn’t want to get up. His head was pounding and all he wanted was more sleep, just more sleep.

He was right on the edge of it too but someone shook his shoulder and he groaned, pulling the blanket down.

Ryan was there with a glass of water and a couple of pills in his hand, a soft smile on his face.

“Hey, man. How yah feeling?” He asked, helping Jared to sit up.

“Like a fucking bus ran me over.” Jared groaned, covering up his eyes. There was light coming from everywhere, assaulting all of his senses.

“Take this.” Ryan said, thrusting the pills and water at Jared. “You’ll start to feel better.”

Jared just made a sound in the back of this throat in response, taking the pills and nearly swallowing them dry before he realized that he had the water for a reason. He was sure that he was still kinda drunk. Which was not going to make it a fun rest of the day.

“Your alarm went off on your phone which I guess means that you have to be at work soon.” Ryan asked, keeping a watchful eye on Jared and staying a respectful distance from him.

Jared looked around the room, taking in his surroundings, trying to get his head to stop spinning.

“Yeah.” Jared groaned in reply. I gotta be at school at 8:15 for bus duty.” A moment passed and the pounding seemed to get louder. “Fuck. I didn’t even drink that much.”

Ryan chuckled. “You drank a little more than you might think, buddy. You asked for another drink when we got back here and once a bartender, also a bartender. Plus, you did this fucking puppy dog eye thing that I couldn’t deny. Either way, you might want to call in today. You got like four hours of sleep and you look like hell.”

“Thanks.” Jared mumbled, not amused. “But I can’t. This is my first year teaching and it’s only the first month of school and I can’t tell you how bad it would look if I called in because I decided to drink on a Monday night.”

“Well, you are more than welcome to use my shower and then I’ll take you back to the bar to pick up your car.” Ryan stated, helping Jared climb to his feet.

Jared narrowed his eyes at the man, searching for the alternative motive. Ryan was being nice, almost too nice and he was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Maybe there would be a wife that would walk in through the door right now, her being an overnight nurse and all, and Jared would be some home wrecker and feel even worse about himself than he does now.

“I promise, I’m not going to do anything, Jared. Last night was fun and I wouldn’t mind it happening again but I know that’s all it was, alright. Right now, I’m more worried about getting you to look like you didn’t just spend a long night in a strangers bed and in front of those kids to teach them a well needed education.” Ryan explained, holding his hands up in a way of surrender.

Still Jared hesitated before finally he gathered all this clothes from the ground and walked to the shower after Ryan told him where it was. He took a cold one, hoping that it would wake his tired body up. He was sore all over and there was a nice pull to his muscles when he moved one way or another that told him that he most certainly enjoyed last night but he felt completely awful.

Saying that a bus ran him over would be a dramatic understatement.

Ryan was in the living room, keys in hand, waiting for Jared to come out.

They drove back to the bar in silence. It wasn’t as comfortable as it is when he’s with Jensen and there is nothing to be said but it felt familiar. It felt good. Ryan pulled to a stop by Jared’s car and unlocked the doors for Jared to get out but Jared didn’t move.

He turned to Ryan, swallowing thickly. “Umm… thanks for last night.” Jared said, stumbling through the words. He wasn’t used to his one night stands to go off this smoothly. But then again, that was back when he was in college and everyone was looking for someone and they were all wild and immature.

Here they were both consenting adults who knew what they were asking for and they weren’t asking for anything else.

“Yeah man, no problem. Like I said, it was fun and if ever wanna get this Jensen dude off your mind again, you know where to find me.” Ryan clasped a hand around Jared’s shoulder and gave him a quick peck on the lips.

Jared stared at him, mind once again racing and he sighed internally because he was tired of thinking. He had already done too much of it this morning and he just wanted the sound to stop but he didn’t think that he actually said Jensen’s name when he was explaining his predicament last night.

“I didn’t tell you his…”

“Yeah, you did.” Ryan cut him off. “On the way back to the house, you couldn’t shut up about the dude. You ask me, he really is missing out on some pretty great stuff, even if he does have that girl but then again, that’s just me.” Ryan shrugged.

“Just… how much did I tell you last night?”

“For the way that you couldn’t shut up, I would say about all of it. The entire last month. Are you sure that you’ve only know him for that long?”

“Yeah.” Jared drew out the word like he wasn’t too sure of it himself. “Why?”

Ryan just shook his head. “Nothing. You two, at least the way that you make it sound, sound like you’ve known each other a lot longer. And if it’s worth anything, if you ask me, he’s not as much of a straight shooter as you make him out to be. I can’t think of anyone that I like platonically that I hang out as much as the two of you do. Especially not within the first few weeks of meeting them.”

“What are you trying to say?” Jared asked, more like whined because he didn’t need to think of this right now. He needed to think of this least of all.

“I’m just saying, I can’t think of any of my friends that I came out to who acting completely the same as they did before I told them. And I really can’t think of any of my friends who proceeded to bring me coffee in the morning and steal my bag and was excited to eat lunch with me again and all the other shit you said he does right after me coming out to them. Not saying that this dude ain’t a saint because hell, what do I know, I’m justing saying, no dude is that much of a saint.”

Jared swallowed and he couldn’t seem to get rid of the lump in his throat.

“Umm… well, yeah, okay.” Jared reached for the door. “I’ll see you around, Ryan.” And he meant it. He really did. He just needed to get out and be by himself for a moment before his thoughts swallowed him whole.

“You know where to find me.” Ryan said before pulling away, probably to head back to his house to get a few more hours of sleep.

Half dead, Jared climbed into his car and made his way to school. As he half expected, Jensen was already in the parking lot, two cups of coffee with him, one in his hand, another on the hood of his car. Jared was in no hurry and he took his time to park and get out and join Jensen, taking the coffee with greedy hands. Maybe it was caffeine he needed. The cold shower hardly did anything.

Jensen took one look at him and whistled. “Rough night?”

Jared shook his head, drinking gulps of the coffee, completely ignoring the way that it burned before he looked at Jensen. He could only look him in the eye for a second or two before he had to look away, Ryan’s words swimming around in his head.

“No. Fun night. Rough morning.” He corrected. 

Jensen pursed his lips and nodded like he had been there before.

“And on a Monday night too. You’re more of a party animal than I thought there, Padalecki.” Jensen hummed his approval as they started to walk towards the school.

“I wasn’t planning on it.”

“Yeah, well what made you decide to go out and get drunk?” There was a teasing lilt to Jensen’s voice but there was something there that Jared could detect but couldn’t place and he didn’t feel like trying to decode it.

_ You _ . He wanted to say.

Instead he shrugged. “Don’t know. Went to the bar for a beer. One turned into two. Then three. Then there was whiskey involved and the bartender was pretty hot and when he offered, I didn’t deny. But that meant that I got like four hours of sleep and a massive headache.” Jared would be lying if he tried to say that he wasn’t watching Jensen’s face for a reaction as he explained his night.

Surprisingly there was something dark that crossed over Jensen’s eyes before it disappeared. The corner of his mouth turned down ever so slightly and he took a sip of his coffee, as if to think of something to say to that.

Ryan’s words were screaming at him now, that there might be something more than what meets the eye to Jensen.

“Well, I’m proud of you, man.” Jensen cuffed Jared on the arm but it was weak and halfhearted. “You’re gonna have to introduce me to this bartender that managed to sway you off your feet.”

Jared laughed to himself because he was sure that he could hear jealousy in Jensen’s voice and he was sure that he was just making it up. His brain fucking with him because it was mad at him for putting it through the wringer last night.

“You make it sound like we’re getting married.” Jared said through a laugh. “It was nothing serious. His name was Ryan and and was nice and all but it was just a one night kind of thing. We’re nowhere near close to what you and Danneel have.”

Jensen looked over at Jared, looking him up and down before he nodded, seeming as if he wasn’t happy with Jared’s answer but that it was going to be okay enough for him.

“We gotta find you somebody then.” Jensen declared as they made their way over to where the buses would be lining up.

That threw Jared completely off guard. He shot Jensen a look but Jensen was staring in front of him, drinking from his cup, sighing when he realized that he drank every last drop of it.

“What?” Jared coughed out once he recovered from swallowing more than a mouthful of coffee.

“Yeah. We need to find you someone. You deserve to have someone too, you know.” Jensen said, throwing back the words that Jared had told him yesterday. “You’re a pretty awesome dude and yeah, you need someone too.”

Jared was searching for something, anything to reply back to Jensen but luckily he didn’t have to say anything. Genevieve seemed to appear out of nowhere, pulling both of their attention away from each other and on her small frame and Jared was never more grateful that she showed up. He would take any kind of lecture that he would get from her over having to listen to Jensen trying to set him up with someone. This imaginary someone.

“Well I’ll be damned, someone actually showed up on time. Again. For an entire month in a row.” She said, just taking Jared’s cup out of his hand and taking a sip from the coffee. “Proud of you, Padalecki. Really didn’t think that you had it in you.”

Jensen stared wide eyed at her and Jared decided then and there that he really liked this woman. As if he didn’t know that during the past month.

“I promised you I would.” Jared said taking his cup back and Jensen glared at the offending thing.

“You did but I never thought that you would actually follow through with it. I’ve been promised many things by guys like you and they never do seem to do what they say.”

“Oh yeah.” Jared challenged. “And just what kind of guys are like me?”

“You know exactly the type. The tall, big and strong, jocks who think that they can do whatever they want, when they want all because they have the looks and the deep timber of their voice.” She said, placing her hand on Jared’s bicep, squeezing just a little bit.

That seemed to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Jensen looked between the two of them, completely bewildered before he chuckled awkwardly.

“Alright you two.” He said, voice strained if only you knew how to listen to it and Jared did. “Stop flirting. You’re about to have kids milling around. Save it for closed doors.” He snapped and with that, he walked off towards the building in a huff of breath.

Both Jared and Genevieve stared after Jensen, Jared more bewildered than anything, wondering what the hell had gotten into him. The coffee suddenly left a sour taste in Jared’s mouth and the thought that he had done something wrong plagued his mind. Which he knew was ridiculous but still the thought lingered. He wasn’t sure what he had done wrong though. Couldn’t think of anything that he had done in the short time that he had seen Jensen to cause him to walk off like that.

Other than him saying that he went home with someone last night and then started talking to Genevieve.

“What’s his problem?” Genevieve asked, drawing Jared away from his thoughts and back to her.

Jared shrugged. “I don’t… know.” Jared turned back to look in the direction where Jensen disappeared. He was frowning.

“If you ask me, he sounded like a jilted lover.”

Jared jerked his attention back to her, eyes wide, mouth probably gaping like a fish. He most certainly felt like it was. “What?” He spit out.

“I mean, I know that he’s not but still. Whatever.” She shrugged. “He might just be in a bad mood because he and Danneel got into a fight last night. I’m sure he’ll be fine later today.”

Once again Jared felt like a rug had been pulled out from underneath him and he just stared at Genevieve in front of him. “How the hell do you know that?” He asked, a little harsher than he meant and Genevieve threw her hands up, taking a little half step back.

“Woah, hey, I didn’t mean anything…”

“Shit. No, no, no. I didn’t mean for it to come across like that.” Jared pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath, filling his lungs with as much air as he could before letting it out like that. “I’m sorry. It’s just been a very long morning. I didn’t mean…” He trailed off, shaking his head. The weekend couldn’t come fast enough.

Genevieve took another step forward and placed her hand on Jared’s arm, trying to center him. “Hey, it’s okay.” She said softly. “Danneel and I are friends. That’s all. She texted me last night, a little upset. She said that it wasn’t a big deal. They fight sometimes but she said that Jensen is acting…”

Then Jared cut her off, holding up his hand to stop her from speaking anymore. “Hey, you don’t have to tell me this. It’s not my place to know. What’s happening between them, that’s their business and you don’t have to tell me anything just to explain yourself. I was wrong for snapping at you. I’m sorry.”

She titled her head just a bit, staring at Jared through squinted eyes like she was trying to figure him out.

“You’re an odd one, Jared.” She finally said, righting herself. “I guess it’s a good thing that you’re cute.” She said with a fond smile and Jared felt himself return it. “But seriously, don’t worry about him too much. “He just deals with a lot with the school and the first few weeks are always stressful. For anyone.”

Jared nodded back. Maybe that’s all it was. Stress from the first few weeks of school that had Jensen suddenly jumping at the bit to want to hook Jared up with someone and then the way that he just stormed off. Sure, that made sense.

The buses started pulling up and luckily for Jared, he didn’t have to sit around and dwell on it for long. He focused on getting the kids off the bus and inside the building. When the first bell rang, both him and Genevieve lingered around, picking up the stray kids before they both went their own ways.

Luckily, for his pounding head, his first period class didn’t feel like talking much, more concerned about actually getting the work done. By the time the period ended, the pounding behind his eyes had subsided enough that it was a dull throb, something that he could manage. It was a little easier to talk during second period. The sound of questions no longer sounded like nails to a chalkboard to Jared. There were a couple of kids who asked if Jared was alright and Jared replied with a tight smile and nodded.

He drank enough water to flood a small village and no one said anything when he left the room to run down to the restroom.

When the bell rang for lunch, Jared planned on just staying in his room, try to get a few minutes of rest in. He had roughly two hours before fourth period would start and that was just enough time to rest. He didn’t want to skip the lunch meetings with Jensen but there was something off about him, didn’t take a genius to figure that out. He was going to give Jensen space and tomorrow morning he would test the water again.

The decision to stay in his room was made even easier when a couple of kids asked if they could spend lunch in Jared’s classroom to finish working. He told them that they could if they promised to stay quiet and actually worked on their assignment. And he also told them that it wasn’t going to be a regular thing.

The kids were quiet and while Jared didn’t get any sleep, he was able to put his head down on his desk and close his eyes for a few minutes. He downed another bottle of water and made another quick trip to the restroom and he was finally starting to feel like a person again.

Lunch ended and everyone left him room and he was suddenly faced with a silence that he wasn’t used to. It had only been a week but he was already used to being with someone else on his off period, listening to the steady breathing from Jensen or the rustle of paper or the tapping of a pen when Jensen got particularly agitated with something. Here, in his classroom, Jared could practically hear a feather drop. It made him restless.

An hour and a half, that’s all he had to endure and then there would be students in their seats and there would be sound and then Jared was going to be able to go home, pet his Harley and Sadie and sleep until the morning.

There was a tentative knock at his door and Jared raised his head, blinking a couple of times, trying to get rid of the stars that danced in his vision in the sudden light.

Jensen was standing in the doorway, looking sheepish, out of place like he suddenly wasn’t welcome in Jared’s room. He smiled when Jared focused on him but it didn’t reach his eyes. He didn’t walk in further into the room.

“Hey.” Jensen said, swallowing hard enough that Jared could see his Adam’s apple bob. “I just wanted to apologize about, you know, this morning. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that or… or tried to push you into finding someone to be a relationship with. That wasn’t… wasn’t very cool of me. Your business is your business and what you wanna do is what you should do.”

Jared watched the calculated way that Jensen was holding himself, standing right within the threshold of the classroom, not intruding on Jared’s space as if to give him him room. The words sounded almost rehearsed, like he had been practicing them over and over before he actually came here and that made something tug at Jared’s heart.

“There’s nothing you need to apologize for, Jensen.” Jared answered truthfully, smiling at Jensen with a smile that was real. “Now, are you going to come in and have a seat or do you plan to stand there for the next hour and a half?”

Jensen blinked like he couldn’t really believe that Jared was inviting him inside.

He treaded carefully as he walked into the room and took a seat at the desk that he proclaimed as his that weekend. Jared watched him, the way that Jensen had his eyes cast to the ground, chewing on his bottom lip in the most distracting way possible.

He chuckled softly, more to himself than to Jared. “You know, it might sound silly but when you didn’t show up for lunch today, I thought that you were pissed at me for the shit that I said this morning. That or you heard the things that…” He didn’t finish his sentence.

“Oh no.” Jared quickly countered, trying not to dwell on that unfinished thought, what it could mean. “I wasn’t mad at you.” It was the truth, Jared wasn’t mad at him. “I had some kids that wanted to work on some work during lunch and my head was pounding and the way that you left this morning, I just thought that you wanted some time alone.”

Jensen looked sad all of the sudden. “I didn’t mean for it to come across like that. It’s just…” But he started to shake his head, dropping his face in his hands. His shoulders dropped like all of the sudden everything in him just collapsed.

Jared was on his feet in an instant and by Jensen’s side, a hand on his shoulder.

“Hey, are you alright?” Jared asked, craning his neck trying to catch Jensen’s eye.

Jensen just made a sound for a reply and Jared sat down on the desk next to him. He waited for Jensen to regain him composer, build back up the walls that he had holding him up and if Jensen wanted to talk, then Jared would listen but if he didn’t then Jared would still be there for moral support.

“What all do you know about me, Jared?” Jensen asked suddenly, completely out of the blue.

Jared faltered for a second. “What… what do you mean?”

“What have you heard about me from the people around here. Around school. What has people told you about me?” He was still looking at the ground. There was nothing in Jensen’s voice which told Jared that he was afraid of what Jared might say.

“I haven’t heard anything about you.” Jared said, still trying to get Jensen to look at him but he was fixated on the ground.

Jensen scoffed.

“I’m serious. I haven’t heard anything about you.”

“So you haven’t heard that I’m a cunning, two-faced snake who will do anything I have to do to reach the top?” Jensen’s voice was completely neutral, his jaw ticking just ever so slightly.

Talk about a complete blindside. “Woah, dude. What? Why would anyone say that about you?”

Jensen scoffed again and this thing that half resembled a bitter smile twisted onto his face. “Why wouldn’t they say that about me? They think it so thus make it truth.” There was mock authority in Jensen’s voice, like he was declaring something. He turned his head just a little to look at Jared. “You really haven’t heard any of this?”

As if the look on Jared’s face wasn’t an answer to that question. “No. I haven’t.”

“Earlier this year you asked me why the history department hates me so much. You wanna know why?” Jared wasn’t sure if he wanted to say yes but he nodded anyway. It was clearly tearing Jensen apart that he thought Jared knew something ugly about him, that he might have heard it from someone else other than him. “The entire history department, hell, the entire school, thinks that I slept my way to the top, slept my way into the department chair. Misha and I were friends before I started working here. He became a principal and I became a school teacher. It was completely by chance that I got transferred here. Didn’t even know that Misha was the principal. The superintendent was the one that wanted me to move here. He had caught wind that the current department chair was having inappropriate relations with a student and that they needed someone to fill the position. Misha didn’t believe that any of the other teachers would do a good enough job and so he went to the board for help in looking for a new teacher. The school I taught at before this one was a pretty bad school. Everyone wanted to transferred out of that one.”

Jensen paused and took a deep breath. Jared didn’t say anything yet. Couldn’t.

“Anyway, I get transferred here, get fucking hired as the department chair. Shiny new title to my name, shiny new office, shiny new paycheck and I’m working under one of my friends. Someone, still don’t know who started a rumor that the only reason why I had gotten a job here was because I slept with my friend. That I started the allegations towards the other teacher just so I could get his position. They started dragged Danneel’s name through the mud, saying all kinds of awful things about her. I did the only thing that I knew how to get everything to stop and I filed a lawsuit against everyone in the department, anyone who explicitly participated in slandering my girlfriend. Ever since then everyone at this school hates me, scared to cross me because they think that I’m going to file a lawsuit against them. And the thing is, it didn’t bother me when they started saying shit about me. That I can handle but they fucking started saying things to Danneel, started sending her fucking threats about being in the whole conspiracy just so I could support her so she could go off and write about awful fashion. I couldn’t just idly stand by and let that happen.”

He stopped talking and it felt like all of the oxygen was sucked out of the room with a story like that and the only thing that Jared could think about saying was what the fuck because what the fuck? Jared was completely dumbfounded.

“I tried to get them to stop before I filed the lawsuit, say that Danneel had nothing to do with it and that this teacher really did have this prolonged relationship with this kid but no one believed me. They wouldn’t. It was easier to make me the scapegoat then believe that he would do something like that.” Jensen continued.

“They didn’t believe you?” Jared repeated. “How could they not believe you. I mean, this teacher, surely he was brought up on charges or something.”

Jensen scoffed. “That would just make it all too easy wouldn’t it? No. The student had since graduated. The mother was the one who found out about it and went to the police but the girl didn’t want to press charges. She said that it was completely her doing and even though she was underage at the beginning of it, it was completely consensual. The mother wanted to press charges, desperately wanted to, but since the girl was an adult, the mother couldn’t press charges on behalf of the girl. The worse that happened was the teacher was pushed into forced retirement. He got his pension and I hear that he’s living in the Florida Keys right now.”

“What the fuck?” Jared finally said, the only words that he could think of saying still. “I can’t… wow.”

“So today, I thought, I don’t know why, that you heard the story from someone and that was the reason why you went off yesterday and got drunk. That you were trying to wipe the memory of me from your brain cause you couldn’t believe that you would hang out with someone like me. I thought you finally found out.” Jensen sounded ashamed for something that he didn’t even do.

“Dude no. I would never believe that even if I heard it. That’s just fucking crazy and I can’t believe that something like that would happen to you.” Jared still couldn’t wrap his mind around it. “I would  _ never _ believe any of that.”

Then all of the sudden Jensen wrapped his arms around Jared, pulling him for a hug. Jared hesitated for a fraction of a second before he wrapped his arms around Jensen. As soon as he did, Jensen seemed to collapse against Jared, weary from the confession and a truth that wasn’t real.

“God, where have you been all this time, Padalecki?” Jensen mumbled against Jared.

“In school.” Jared replied, keeping his voice light and Jensen laughed.

“Should have just finished earlier. It would have been nice to have a friend stand by me through all that.”

“You said Misha was your friend. Is your friend. Did he not do anything to help?”

“He couldn’t.” Jensen pulled away and yeah, Jared could totally get hooked on the feeling of Jensen’s body against his. “The board had him sign this NDA saying that he couldn’t talk about the relationship at all. The girl wanted to remain anonymous and he couldn’t even mention her name. The only thing that he could say was that he was regretful to see this teacher go but that he had an excellent teacher taking his place who would do a fantastic job.”

“That’s really fucked up. The board basically just threw you under the bus to take the blame for, like, everything.”

“Well, it was either that or stay at a school that was a year from being shut down. I can’t tell you what I would have done if I had stayed there when they closed it. I still keep in contact with some of the folks I taught with over there and most of them still don’t have jobs. They’re on a displacement list right now but that’s no guarantee that they’ll get a job anywhere. But like I said, I would have been fine if they kept Danneel’s name out of it. I would have taken the petty bullshit because my job was to teach kids and I was doing that just fine. In my opinion, the kids come before any kind of friendship that I have at this school.”

“But what about Genevieve? She said that she was friends with Danneel. Did she not back you up or what?”

“That’s actually how they became friends. She knew about the whole ordeal one way or another and apparently she had been following Danni’s blog. When people started attacking Danni, Gen came to defend her, defend me. But we’re in opposite sides of the building. She teaches science, I teach history. Our paths never really overlapped and by the time she tried to help, it was already too late. The damage was done. I guess the only good thing that came out of this was the friendship between the two of them.”

“Well…” Jared ran a hand down his face. “I don’t really know what to say to all that other than the fact that I am really sorry that you have to put up with that shit but just know that I am always going to be your friend. No matter what other people say about you.”

Jensen smiled, one that seemed to go through the whole being of him. Then all of the sudden Jensen just punched Jared on the arm, hard.

“Ow!” Jared exclaimed. “What the hell was that for?”

“Cause you’re gonna make me break my one rule.”

“And what would that be?” Jared asked, rubbing his arm because that really fucking hurt.

“That I put the kids above any friendship at this school. You have to say shit like that and how am I not supposed to be your friend?”

Jared smiled and just shrugged. “It’s impossible not to be my friend. I’m pretty fucking amazing.”

Jensen rolled his eyes but nonetheless agreed.

They didn’t say anything for a long time, just listening to the clock tick on by, counting down the minutes until Jensen had to disappear back to his room and Jared would have to wait to see Jensen again tomorrow morning.

“Hey.” Jensen muttered after a while. “How are you feeling?”

Jared looked at him confused. “Like… mentally?”

“No, idiot. Your hangover. How is that massively oversized head of yours feeling?” Jensen tapped the middle of Jared’s forehead. Jared’s eyes went cross-eyed as he tried to look at Jensen’s finger.

“Oh.” Jared watched as Jensen dropped his hand back to his lap. “I still have a headache but it’s… better.”

“You still look tired.”

“I did only get like four hours of sleep last night. That might have something to do with it.”

“Well, if you want…” He shuffled a little bit in the seat and cleared his throat. “You can rest your head on my shoulder. Try to get a little sleep in before your last class. If the bell doesn’t wake you, I promise that I will.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Jensen replied.

And so Jared did. He rested his head against Jensen’s shoulder and somehow he drifted off into a light nap, body relaxing almost immediately the moment he closed his eyes. It was because he was tired, he reasoned with himself when he woke back up. It had nothing to do with Jensen or the way that he felt completely at ease around him. It wasn’t because he wanted Jensen to know that he had a friend here and would have a friend here, even if he came a few years late.

Jensen woke him carefully a few minutes before the bell rang, shaking him slightly.

“Hey, buddy.” He said softly. “Class is about to start.”

Jared moved slow as he woke back up, gathering himself for one more period. Jensen stayed behind, watching Jared all the way up until the bell rang, mouth working like he wanted to say something but couldn’t bring himself to form the words.

“I’m really glad you’re here, Jared. Don’t know what I would do without you man.” Jensen said quietly in the doorway while Jared was bent over his desk, looking for the roll. By the time he looked up, Jensen was already gone but the words ghosted in the air.

Trouble was going to brew with those words and Jared was only waiting for the storm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If comments be the food of writing, comment on.


	3. Chapter 3

Another couple of weeks had passed without preamble and before he knew it, they were staring down a four day week and then a glorious three day weekend. To say that he needed it would have been an understatement.

Jared’s neck ached from being bent for so long. He hated that he had assigned these essay’s just as much as the kids hated writing them. He especially hated the fact that he decided to assign them a day before the long three day weekend. Everyone was ready to get home and relax and not worry about having to go to school on Monday. Jared knew that he was most certainly looking forward to it.

There was a knock at the door and his neck popped as he looked up. He wasn’t sure how long he had been sitting there at his desk, bent over papers but he knew that it was long enough for the sun to start dipping down further beneath the horizon and for his back to ache.

“I knew you’d still be here.” Jensen said as he walked into the room, taking his place back on top of one of the desk in front of Jared’s table. “The ever studious teacher.” Then he did a fake salute and Jared laughed.

He capped his pen and stacked up the last few remaining essay’s. “Studious? No. Stupid? Yes. I should have known better than to assign an essay right before the long weekend. I don’t want to grade these now and I most certainly don’t want to grade them over the weekend. So here I am, still at school trying to finish them up.”

Jensen smirked before he grabbed the stack and snatched a pen off the table. Before Jared could figure out what he was doing, Jensen was already writing something at the top of the paper, going through each one quickly and threw the stack back on Jared’s desk triumphantly.

“There. Graded. You’re welcome.” Jensen said leaning back with his arms crossed across his chest, looking mighty pleased with himself.

There in the top corners were huge  _ 90 _ written in red pen.

Jared jerked his gaze back up to Jensen, his eyes wide.

“You can’t do that! That’s like…”

“If you say illegal, I’m getting up and walking out of his classroom right now, Padalecki. It’s okay. It’s just a few essay’s and it’s not like anyone is going to notice. A  _ 90 _ is a good safe score and besides, the most important thing is that now you’re done with grading. That’s all that really matters.”

“But…”

“Fine. If you want to actually go through and read the rest of those papers, be my guest. Just… after I leave.” Jensen said around a small sigh.

Jared glanced back down at the papers and realized that he didn’t feel as guilty as he probably should have at the fact that the didn’t grade those last few. As immoral as it might be, Jensen was right, no one would know and the kids would just say that he was in a good and caring mood when he graded them. So it was going to be okay.

He stretched dramatically before leaning back in his seat, already feeling better that he didn’t have anything else left to deal with.

“So what do I owe the pleasure of having you come down here and finish grading my essay’s for me?” Jared asked.

“Well, since it’s a three day weekend and channel 7 says that it’s gonna be a hot one, I was wondering if you wanted to come down to the lake with me this weekend. My family has a lake house that’s right on the water and I have a boat with a kickass sound system. It would just be a little weekend getaway, ya know?” There was something hopeful in Jensen’s voice, like he was really hoping that Jared would come.

Jared didn’t even have to think about it. A weekend out on the lake with Jensen. Water, beer, sun. That sounded like some kind of fools paradise and he would be stupid not to accept the invitation. “Yeah, of course I want to come. Are you kidding me? I haven’t been out to the lake since I was a kid.”

Jensen grinned like the cat that ate the cannery. “Awesome. Great. I’ll text you my address so we can all ride up together. We were planning on heading down tomorrow after school gets out. Try to make the most of the weekend.”

Jared nodded and then he frowned. “We?”

“Yeah. Danneel was gonna tag along too. That won’t… that won’t be a problem will it?” Jensen asked.

Jared hated the way that his stomach dropped when Jensen said Danneel’s name because he had no right to hate the name other than the fact that he kind of did.

She was Jensen’s girlfriend. He kept telling himself that whenever her name was brought up in conversation. They had been together for several years now and from the way that Jensen talks about her whenever she comes up in conversation, things are pretty serious between the two of them. Which meant that the chances of Jared somehow ending up with Jensen go from zero to negative two million. 

However, it was easy to pretend that she wasn’t a part of the equation whenever it was just the two of them together in Jensen’s office.

It wasn’t that Jared explicitly hated her either because he couldn’t. He had met her in real life and she seemed nice enough and every time Jensen gets to talk about her, his entire face lights up and there’s a million stories that he has about the two of them. She makes him happy and for that reason alone, Jared can’t hate her but he still wishes with all his being that she wasn’t there.

He should just be happy about the fact that Jensen invited him to the lake in the first place but Jared couldn’t help but feel like he was intruding on something that he shouldn’t be intruding on. He was a second thought, something to add on and that made Jared’s stomach tie in knots.

“Oh no. Not at all.” Jared said through a forced smile and he was really hoping that Jensen didn’t notice it. “That should be fun.”

The small frown that had slowly started to appear on Jensen’s face disappeared completely and he grinned even wider. “She’s been dying to meet you, you know. Like actually meet you meet you. More than her just popping in for two seconds. I really think the two of you are going to like each other.”

“Yeah, absolutely. I can’t wait either.”

“Good.” Jensen clapped his hands together and popped back up on his feet. “Now come on. Go home. Rest. You’re gonna need it for this weekend. Trust me. Danni is a hard one to keep up with.”

Jared nodded and looked down at the surface of the table, unable to come up with a single excuse to stay longer. So he gathered his stuff and followed Jensen out of the school. They still walked side by side, shoulders occasionally touching but Jensen had started talking about Danneel again and it felt as if they were on opposite sides of the country.

Jared wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to survive this weekend.

When he got home, he popped some leftovers in the microwave and texted one of his friends to take care of the dogs for the weekend. They were more than happy to and Jared plopped down on the couch, resting his plate on his stomach as he turned on the tv.

Even though he knew that Danneel was going to be there, he was still looking forward to hanging out on the lake all day with Jensen. Three days of nothing but him and Jensen and one other person, uninterrupted where they did nothing all day except lay in the sun and drink.

He had finished dinner and just tossed the plate to the side as he pulled his legs up on the couch when his phone went off.

One of the dogs perked its ear up and shot Jared a look for the unreasonable sound before falling back to sleep.

As expected, it was Jensen, texting him his address and saying that they were planning on leaving around nine in the morning, wanting to make the most of the weekend that they had.

Jared replied, saying that he would bring a case of beer and he would be there at nine.

Jensen threatened to leave his perky ass if he was a second late.

That night, Jared went to sleep with a lingering smile on his face.

His alarm clock went off at seven thirty and Jared was too excited to hit snooze, even just once. He hopped out of bed, let the dogs out and took a quick shower. Then he packed a small bag, making sure that he had enough changes of clothes and he decided to wear his swim trunks over to Jensen’s. He planned on staying in the water for as long as he possibly could.

Around eight thirty, he packed the dogs up in his car, grabbed the six pack off the counter and hit the road. He quickly dropped the dogs off who were much too preoccupied to check out their temporary living quarters and new friends than to realize that Jared was actually leaving.

Much to Jared’s delight, he pulled in front of Jensen’s house with several minutes to spare and he grinned to himself as he gathered his belongings and made his way up to Jensen’s house.

It was a nice little place, a nice house in a nice neighbor. The kind of house that any new couple would love to live in and start a family, Jared thought to himself with a frown. But he shook the thought out of his head, got rid of the image of Jensen and Danneel all happy and wrapped up with each other with a new baby in their arms waving to their neighbors as they stood on the front porch.

He barely knocked on the door before Jensen opened it, wearing nothing more than a tank top and his own pair of swim trucks and Jared was sure that he would forget how to breathe if Jensen planned to dress like that for the rest of the weekend. It simply wasn’t fair, with his broad shoulders and his fucking arms and his tiny waist.

“Surprised that you actually got here on time, Padalecki.” Jensen said with a teasing smile as he grabbed for the things in Jared’s hand. “I fully expected having to drive to your house and dragging you out of bed.” Jared followed him inside.

Jared scoffed. “Like you would have actually done that. You and Danneel would have had a great weekend. Not like I would make or break it.”

Jensen set his bag down by the other bag just within the doorway and carried the six pack into the kitchen where there was a cooler sitting open on the island. As expected, everything was in its place, clean and pristine.

“You seriously underestimate how much Danneel actually wants to get to meet you.” Jensen said with his back turned to Jared, shoving the beer in the cooler but there was something in his tone, like it wasn’t Danneel that desperately wanted him to come. Jared’s heart did a little flutter step in his chest, allowing himself to think that maybe that was the case.

Jared glanced around the house but tilted his head just a bit when it was clear that it was only just the two of them.

“Speaking of Danneel, where is she?” Jared asked, totally not checking Jensen out as he opened the door to the fridge and bent over to pick something up from the bottom shelf. “I thought you said that she was coming with us?”

“She is.” Jensen’s voice was muffled by the fridge. “She’s gonna meet us at the lake house later today. She had some revising to do with the articles or something about meeting with the editor, I think.” Jensen shot Jared a look over his shoulder and narrowed his eyes before turning back to the fridge. He pulled some burgers out and some cheese and stuffed that into the cooler.

Jensen quickly packed the rest of the cooler and then he shot Jared a huge grin.

“You ready?” Jensen asked, cooler in hand as they walked back towards the front door.

“Absolutely.” Said around a smile.

Jared followed Jensen out of the house and into Jensen’s Jeep and then they were off towards the lake. For a few minutes they talked about nothing in particular. Students and work and complaining about the other teachers but then they fell into a comfortable silence.

Jensen turned on the radio, some country station playing Hank Williams and Jared turned to look out the window at the passing scenery.

Before Jared knew it, they were pulling off the main road and onto some side road, taking them into the woods. Jensen glanced over at Jared, the weight of the school year seeming to fall off him in waves and Jensen started to look younger than Jared had ever seen him. Jared smiled and Jensen returned it before turning back to the road.

The woods seemed to part and houses started to appear more and more clustered together and if Jared looked hard enough, he could see the sun reflecting off the water..

He felt like a child on Christmas. The sun was coming in through the window, the water was shining back at him and Jensen was sitting in the driver’s seat next to him.

It made him happier than Jared cared to admit.

After a little bit more of driving, Jensen pulled off the dirt road onto another dirt road and it wasn’t far off the roadway that a house seemed to emerge and right behind it, water.

The house wasn’t anything special. At least it didn’t look it from the outside. It was weathered wood, brought from countless rain storms and being right next to the water. It was a single story home with a parking pad right out front and Jared was ashamed to admit that he was happy that there wasn’t another car sitting out there. That meant that he was going to have Jensen to himself just a little while longer.

Jared grabbed his bag from the backseat and went to grab the cooler but Jensen slapped his hand away.

“You are a guest in my house.” Jensen then yanked at Jared’s bag. “You are not to carry anything into this house. You are not to prepare any food in this house this weekend. You are not to do anything of work in this house. You…” Jensen jabbed a finger in Jared’s chest. “Are to enjoy yourself this weekend. That is the only thing that you are going to do.”

So Jared watched helpless as Jensen grabbed both their bags and the cooler into the lake house. He tried to help, a couple of times because he felt like he was just standing passively by while Jensen was doing everything. However every time Jared tried to help, Jensen kept slapping his hand away and finally Jared just gave up.

“You’ve done enough, Jared. You brought me beer and that’s always the most important thing.” Jensen explained as he opened the door and lead Jared inside.

Now, on the inside, the house looked pristine and recently remodeled. To the right there was the huge kitchen with granite countertops and an island. There was a hallway that lead off to somewhere, probably to the bedrooms or bathroom. But the thing that really took Jared’s breath away was that directly in front of him was a wall of windows out looking the lake. There was a boat dock with a ski boat sitting in it, a couple of jet skis.

“This place is amazing.” Jared breathed.

Jensen had already started unloaded. “Yeah.” He looked around a little bit. “It wasn’t like this when I came here as a kid. It’s taken some work to make it look like this but it’s my little piece of paradise for a fraction of the cost, yah know. And being a teacher, it’s not like I can really afford paradise anymore.”

Jared scoffed back a laugh because he knew that was true. Back in college he thought things were tight. He had no idea how tight things were going to get with rent and student loan payments and everything else under the sun that he had to buy. So he understood.

“Danni is gonna bring some more food with her. She likes to do the shopping when we come down here because then she gets to control what we eat. Anyway…” He shoved the cooler away and stood upright. “Let me show you to your room. The sheets are clean, washed them not too long ago but you might want to shake them out for spiders. For whatever reason, I can never seem to keep them out of this place.”

As Jared followed Jensen down the hall, Jensen pointed out where the bathroom was and the room that he and Danni were going to be staying in before coming to a stop in front of the last room in the back of the house.

It was simple and clean. A chest of drawers. A mirror. A bed with a wire frame that looked to be authentic cast wrought iron. Jared wouldn’t mind staying there for a while, forever in fact but he knew that he was going to be spending more time out on the lake than actually in the house.

That’s the whole reason why he came down here in the first place.

“So, you wanna get out on the water or do you wanna…”

Jensen didn’t have to finish the statement. “Of course I do. Let’s go.”

“Awesome.” Jensen smiled back.

He took a quick pit stop by his room to drop off his bag and change into a pair of flip flops. Then they were out of the house and on the boat dock. Even though it wasn’t even noon yet, it was already hot, the humidity thick in the air and Jared was ready to get in the water.

“You wanna take the jet skis out or the boat?” Jensen asked.

“Either one. I don’t care.” Jared replied, happy with either one that Jensen picked.

“Alright. Jet skis it is then.” He turned to a lockbox that was sitting right on the edge of the dock and pulled out the keys to the jet skis. “Heads up, Padalecki.” He said and tossed Jared the key.

Luckily he didn’t drop it.

They spent what felt like forever out on the lake on the jet skis and Jared felt more at ease than he had felt in forever. They raced up and down the lake, taking turns and shooting up water trying to get each other wet. Jared was smiling the entire time, seeing the sun turn Jensen into this seemingly golden god that was almost too bright to look at but Jared just stared.

They went down to the marina when the skis got low on gas and when Jared tried to help pay, Jensen pushed him away with a grin.

“I’ve told you, I’ve got it.”

Then they were back out on the water, racing each other. By the time they got back to the lake house, the sun was starting to set right over the horizon and Danneel was sitting in one of the chairs that were up on the deck, a beer open resting in her lap.

“There you two are.” She said, climbing to her feet as they got up to the desk. She gave Jensen a huge hug before pecking him on the lips and then her bright smile turned to Jared. “Well, it is fantastic to see you again, Jared.” She came in for another hug that Jared was helpless but to return. “I feel like I alright know you with how much Jensen talks about you when he gets home.”

Jared shot Jensen a glance and he was certain that Jensen was blushing, just ever so slightly. But then again it could have just been the sun painting him that red glow.

“He talks about you all the time too.” Jared replied, pulling her in for yet another hug. “So I feel like I already know you too.”

And that wasn’t a lie. Jensen talked so much about Danneel whenever he saw the opportunity and it was like he had already met the girl and got to know her on his own.

She just shot Jensen a knowing look. “I’m so glad that you could join us. I mean, I’ve been wanting to actually meet you ever since that one day at school but with work and y’all teaching school, it never seemed to work out until now.”

“Well, you two crazy kids have fun out here, I’m going to get a start on supper. Lord knows that Jared is going to eat it all.”

Jared halfheartedly cuffed Jensen on the shoulder as he went inside. Jared stood there for a second before he sat down in one of the chairs next to Danneel. She offered him a beer and he took it, looking forward to something cold after being out in the sun all day.

They talked for a little bit and the more that they talked, the more that Jared hated her more for not being able to hate her. She was literally the total package and she was absolutely perfect for Jensen. It was only about thirty minutes before Jensen showed back up on the dock, proudly declaring that supper was ready. They both got up and followed Jensen inside.

It smelled delicious, Jared knew that. Homemade burgers and french fries and Jared’s stomach growled.

“Oh god.” Jared moaned around the mouthful of food when they finally got sat down and seated. Jensen knew how to make a burger. “These are the best things that I’ve ever eaten in my life.” Jared said around a mouthful of food. He swallowed. “I thought you said that you couldn’t cook.”

Jensen laughed. “No. I said that I didn’t have time to cook, not that I couldn’t cook. Those are two completely different things there, Jared.”

Jared felt himself flush and he quickly took a sip of sweet tea to cover it up.

When dinner was finished, Jared helped Jensen clean up much to Jensen’s dismay but Jared wasn’t just going to sit around and do nothing while Jensen did everything. His mama raised him right and that was to help whenever he could help.

That night they stayed out on the desk, watching the stars before they all decided to turn in.

In the morning, Jared woke to the smell of bacon sizzling and coffee brewing. When he made it into the kitchen, Jensen was standing there in sweats and a t-shirt, hovering over the stove, tending to bacon in one skillet and pancakes in the other skillet. The water was running in the bathroom and Jared assumed that Danneel was taking a shower.

“That smells damn good.” Jared said coming up behind Jensen and looked over his shoulder at the food.

Jensen seemed to glow with the compliment. “I’m gonna make some eggs too, if you want some. Help yourself to the coffee. It’s gonna be a minute before it’s all done.”

That’s what Jared did. He poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at one of the bar stool around the island and watched as Jensen moved around the kitchen, preparing breakfast for the three of them. He looked so comfortable, taking a sip of coffee every now and then as he added yet another pancake to the stack. There was nothing better than watching Jensen like this.

Then Danneel came from the shower, hair wrapped up in a towel and she kissed Jensen on the cheek and the ease that Jared felt watching Jensen disappeared with the appearance of her.

They were all too hungry to talk much through breakfast and the food was much too good to ruin it with conversation. When everything was eaten and once again Jared helped Jensen with the dishes, they all got out on the ski boat, Jensen driving it to the middle of the lake before stopping it. He cracked open a beer, offered one to Jared, who took it gladly and leaned back in his seat, soaking up the sun.

A little before lunch, the three of them got into the water, splashing each other like school children. They went back to the house for lunch, ate some sandwiches and chips before heading back out onto the lake. This time, instead of swimming, Jensen broke out the skis and both Jared and Jensen took their turns skiing.

By the time that they brought the boat back in for the night, Jared was sore all over, just a little red from the sun and his face hurt from smiling too much.

Supper was cooked once again by Jensen and they ate it out on the deck, sipping cold beers. Danneel was the one that collected the dirty dishes and when he returned, she returned bearing gifts.

“I got stuff to make smores and the whiskey to go along with it.” She said proudly holding out the ingredients to the smores and the fifth of Jack that she had bought.

Jensen threw his head back and laughed, making grabby hands for the alcohol which she laughed when she handed it over to him. He unscrewed the top and took a sip, sighing out in satisfaction before passing the bottle over to Jared. He took an equally long sip before offering the bottle to Danneel. She shook her head.

“I’m good. Got that for the two of you. Go wild.” She said, sticking the marshmallows on the end of the metal sticks that she had and stuck them over the fire.

They each ate their weight in smores, not stopping until their stomachs hurt from the sugar and by that point, between Jared and Jensen, they drank nearly the entire bottle and Jared knew that he was most certainly feeling it. His head felt heavy and light at the same time. He was staring at the flames of the fire, watching at the embers tried to turn into stars in the sky.

“Well, you two…” Danneel had perched herself in Jensen’s lap and she slapped his thigh before climbing to her feet. “This was fun but I am going to go ahead and retire for the night. I have an early morning tomorrow, gotta get back to the city. Unlike you two boys, I don’t have the day off.” She kissed Jensen. “I’ll see y’all in the morning.”

And like that, they were alone once again.

“Pass me back the bottle.” Jensen said, staring at Jared.

They finished it off and Jared’s head was lulling back and forth, his eyes heavy.

“You falling asleep over there, Jared?” Jensen’s voice sounded loud in the night. Cicadas were crying all around them.

“Pshh, no.” Jared slurred back, his eyes shutting anyway.

“Yeah?” There was a smile in Jensen’s voice. “Cause it looks like to me you’re falling asleep over there.”

“I’m not.”

“Mhmm.” Jared replied, staring up at the sky. Several minutes passed and it was getting harder and harder to stay awake. His eyes kept wanting to close and the cool, gentle breeze that was blowing was doing nothing more than making Jared want to sleep more. “Aright. I lied.” Jared declared, staggering to his feet. “I am falling asleep so I think that I’ll go ahead and sleep in a bed before I sleep out here.”

He started walking back up to the house when Jensen stopped him with a hand around his wrist.

“I’ll be up there in a few moments.” He said.

And Jared nodded back, more intent on sleeping than really paying attention to anything else around him.

He barely got his shoes off before he fell into bed and within seconds, his eyes were closed and he was drifting off to sleep. The door to his bedroom creaked open and Jared mumbled something, too far gone to make any sense. But when the blankets were lifted off of him and the warmth of another body slid into bed beside him, Jared woke back up, eyes wide awake.

Jensen nestled in close to Jared, curling into his warmth.

“Jensen?” Jared asked, voice careful. “What are you doing?”

“Sleeping.” Jensen replied, slightly annoyed.

“Yeah, I can see that. But… you’re in my bed.”

“Mhmm. Problem?”

Jared shook his head before stopping himself because he realized that Jensen couldn’t see it. His eyes were shut and his breathing was evening out. “Well, you’re kinda in  _ my _ bed.”

“Yeah. I know.” A moment pause. “Will you shut up and just sleep?” Jensen barked out, sounding grumpy and annoyed.

“But you’re in my bed.” Jared said again, as if that would change anything.

“Yes. We’ve already covered that.”

“Jensen… you’ve got your own bed. With your girlfriend to sleep in.”

“I know.” Jensen’s voice was lower. “But I wanna sleep here. Next to you.” A moment passed. “Operative word being sleep. Not talk. So shut your trap and sleep.”

The drunk part of Jared’s brain seemed okay with that. Sleep sounded good. Sleep sounded damn good. So the rational part of his brain stopped trying to reason with Jensen because there was nothing to reason with. So he went to sleep with Jensen right next to him.

In the morning, the sun came pouring in through the blinds, waking Jared up right at the crack of dawn. His brain was slow to take in everything around him, still muddled with alcohol and his mouth was parched.

And Jensen was still in his bed.

Jared scrambled out of it, rushing to his feet and away from the man that was wrapped around him. Jensen was still asleep, snoring lightly to himself. Jared’s heart was pounding through his chest because he did not just do this. He did not just let Jensen spend the night in his bed with his girlfriend sleeping just a few doors down the hallway. But the evidence was there. There was no way that he could deny the fact that Jensen was sleeping in his bed.

So he rushed to the kitchen, needing caffeine or water or something to wake him up.

He nearly jumped when he saw Danneel sitting at the island, a cup of coffee in her hand, her hair tied up on top of her head. Jared edged carefully in the room, trying to watch for signs that Danneel might turn around and throw daggers at him for sleeping next to Jensen but there was nothing. She looked well rested, calm, like nothing was out of the ordinary. She turned her head when she heard Jared’s shuffled footsteps.

“Good morning, Jared. I made the coffee. Not as good as Jensen’s but hey, it’s something.” Danneel said, pointing towards the coffee maker with her cup.

“Yeah… umm… thanks.” He stuttered through his words, skirting around the kitchen to the coffee marker.

Danneel looked at him funny. “You alright, Jared?”

“Yeah!” Jared jumped, faking a smile. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because you keep cutting your eyes over here at me like I’m about to shoot lasers out of my eyes at you or something like that.”

“Oh.” Jared laughed, or tried to laugh. It sounded too high pitch to his ears. “Yeah, no. Everything is fine. I’m fine. Nothing’s wrong.”

“Okay.” She said, drawing out the word. “Whatever you say.”

She waited until Jared had poured his cup of coffee and sat down across the island before she spoke again. “You know, it’s alright that Jensen slept in your bed last night. I don’t hold it against you. Nothing you do.” She didn’t wait until Jared had finished swallowing his drink and he nearly spit it all out.

“What?” He tried to play innocent, knowing that he didn’t play it well.

“Come on, Jared. I’m not stupid. He didn’t come to my bed last night and there’s only one more bed in this place besides the couch and well, he wasn’t on the couch this morning so that only leaves one place and that’s your bed. At least tell me that he didn’t hog all the covers. He tends to do that.”

“Umm…” Jared frowned, not expecting this kind of response from Danneel, not from his girlfriend. “No. He didn’t… hog all the covers.” He looked around the kitchen, expecting to see cameras or something because shit like this never went this smoothly. “How are you so okay with this?”

She shrugged around the sip of her coffee. “Just am, I guess. I don’t know, it doesn’t surprise me. With how he talks about you, it doesn’t really seem too far fetched. He just needed some liquid courage to actually do it.”

Jared’s mind was reeling, how any of this was okay to her but then Jensen stumbled into the kitchen, cutting off any and all conversation that they were going to have about him. He didn’t say anything as he walked over to the coffee pot and fixed his cup and plopped down right next to Jared, leaning on him ever so slightly.

“I’ve gotta go, babe.” Danneel said and Jensen just nodded. “I’ll see you back at home.”

Jensen made a sound in response but he was dead to the world. At least until he finished his first cup of coffee and then he might be able to make a couple of words.

Danneel stood up and held Jared’s gaze as she did so, saying something with just a look that he was somehow supposed to decode but Jared had no idea what she was trying to get at.

“Somethings look as if they’re gonna work out, Jared, then never do but then there are things that don’t look that they’re gonna work out but do. Just remember that.” She said before disappearing down the hallway to get ready to leave.

Jensen waved after her when she was all packed and she didn’t even bother to give Jensen a kiss. She just looked at Jared with something soft in her eyes and hidden meanings.

It took Jensen a while to get his feet back underneath him. It looked as if the alcohol hit him hard and Jared didn’t miss the opportunity to call Jensen old which Jensen grumped at him and tried to slap the back of Jared’s head but Jensen ducked out of the way before he could.

They packed up the rest of the house. Stripped the beds and put the sheets in the back of Jensen’s Jeep to wash when he got home and they left.

Neither one of them said anything about Jensen showing up in Jared’s bed that night.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If comments be the food of writing, comment on.


	4. Chapter 4

Something had settled over them. The next few weeks, it felt as if there was an exposed wire between the two of them. Not awkward per se but it was like there was something that shifted in the air and suddenly any silence that stretched on seemed like it was seconds from catching on fire.

They were in Jensen’s office, eating lunch, not really talking to each other, not really looking at each other, just there.

A couple of times, Jared tired to bring up the lakehouse, tried to bring up the fact that Jensen decided to crawl in his bed and stay there but he was too much of a coward to actually get the words out. And it wasn’t like Jensen seemed to remember in the first place. Never mind the fact that it was very obvious that he woke up in Jared’s bed and not his own but they were still friends. That’s all that mattered to Jared. They were friends and he wasn’t about to fuck that shit up with asking stupid questions.

It happened and there was nothing that could change the fact.

Jensen cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck, an uneasy tick to him as he looked toward the ground. It was as if his shoes had become the most interesting thing to look at.

“So… umm… there’s a game on Sunday and I was thinking about grilling some burgers or whatever.”  Jensen paused for a moment, as if Jared automatically knew what he was trying to get at. And the thing was, Jared was pretty sure that he did know. He just didn’t want to get his hopes up about something and it actually turn out to not be the case. “You’re more than welcome to come over… if you don’t, like, have other plans or something. I mean, it would just be the two of us, just me… I mean…” He was rambling and in the entire time that Jared’s known Jensen, he’s never heard him ramble and he’s most certainly never seen him blush. Not like this. 

Not even when those group of kids found the pictures of when he was a teenager and decided that it would be a great idea to do a shirtless modeling stint.

And yet here he was, blushing and rambling when all he was asking for was if Jared wanted to come over to the game. Which meant it was more than ‘just coming over to see the game.’

Not to mention, when Jensen blushed, it made all the freckles on his face pop even more.

“Yes.” Jared answered all too quickly. “I mean, yeah sure. I would love to. I don’t have anything else to do.”

“Oh.” Jensen replied, a smile breaking out on his face like he was expecting a different kind of answer. “Awesome.”

“I’ll bring the beer.” Jared declared and that was that.

They didn’t say anything else to each other. They didn’t hug. Didn’t do anything other than just smile at each other and then went their separate ways to their cars, both more excited about the game than they should have been.

The Boys had been on a losing streak and it didn’t look like they were suddenly turn around and pull out a win.

That night Jared was restless. He couldn’t get his mind to settle, no matter how much he wished it would. This wasn’t any different than any other time that he’d been over to Jensen’s house. The would have burgers, crack open a couple of cold ones. Jensen would sit in his spot on the couch and Jared would stay on his end of the couch. They would watch the game. Complain about the calls and the penalties being made and how the refs obviously had it out for their team. When the game was over, maybe they would watch the highlight show that came on afterwards and then he would leave. It would be like any other weekend, any other time that they shared a beer and watched the game. Yet, even as Jared tried to reason with himself, say that was the case, he couldn’t really convince himself of it.

It wasn’t going to be the same, like any other time because they weren’t the same anymore. Not really. Something had changed over the lake weekend and Jared wasn’t able to pinpoint what it was or if it was a good or bad thing. He hoped it was good. He wanted it to be good but if he knew anything about Jensen, it was he really knew nothing about him, about what he was thinking about, feeling.

I mean, sure, he knew the small things. He knew that when Jensen got nervous, he rubbed the back of his neck or when he was thinking hard about something, he would always bite the end of his pen. He knew that he was a bombass cook and once wanted to be a physical therapist before he wanted to teach and before that wanted to be a fisherman. He knew that he was afraid of thunderstorms when he was younger and hated spiders. Knew that he could sing and would prefer to be surrounded by friends and family than be famous. He knew that Jensen never forgot a name, a face. He was one of the kindest people Jared ever meet, to kids and adults alike. He knew that everyone either wanted to be Jensen or be with Jensen.

But when it came to his thoughts, his emotions, his fucking feelings, Jared was absolutely oblivious as to what was going through that beautiful head of his.

And never mind the fact that he was too scared to actually think about what Jensen might be thinking.

That weekend completely changed everything that Jared thought he knew about this man that he called his friend too.

Jared sighed and rubbed at his eyes, wishing for sleep to come but didn’t get the sweet relief of it.

He threw the blankets off his body and made his way to his medicine cabinet, grabbing a couple of sleeping pills and swallowed them dry. Still sleep didn’t come immediately but one moment he was thinking of this change that settled in between the two of them and then the next he couldn’t remember much of anything other than green eyes and freckles.

When he woke up the next morning, the little red numbers on his alarm clock were blinking a little past nine. Sleep still pulled at the corner of his eyes and he thought about just slipping back to sleep. He couldn’t remember the last time he slept well into the afternoon like he used to do when he was a teenager and it sounded like a good thing to do. He needed a day where he just laid in bed and did nothing all day.

However there was work calling his name. There was a stack of essays that he desperately needed to grade and he knew that if he neglected them for another weekend, the little monsters that he taught was literally going to tear his face off in search for a grade. Then he needed to run to the liquor store and pick up a case of beer even though he still had a few left in the fridge. It seemed cheap of him to just show up at Jensen’s house with half a case.

So instead of sleeping in even more, he crawled out from underneath the warmth of his blankets and was attacked immediately by Sadie and Harley.

“Alright.” He groaned, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and lead them to the back door to let them out.

The uneasiness still hadn’t left him from the night before and he made his way to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee, he decided that it might be a good idea to go for a run. It had been a while since he’s gone on one and it always seemed to relax him. Gave him something else to think about for a moment. It was always nothing more than the steady rise and fall of his feet, the deep breathing.

With having to be up at school early in the morning to help with bus duty and then staying up late into the night grading the endless amount of work meant that he wasn’t able to exercise and run as much as he wanted to and with Jensen’s amazing cooking, frozen or not, meant that he was a little more out of shape than he cared to admit.

Back in high school, when he was still a student and was stressing about things like AP exams and getting into a good college and getting those scholarships to afford the tuition, he joined track. He played basketball, was okay at it. His height didn’t come in until late into his high school career but track was something he was good at. He did the mile races and he won the majority of them and it always seemed to ease his nerves, no matter what it was.

So he grabbed the leashes for the dogs and off they went. It was way overdue for the both of them to get some good exercise in.

However, what usually gave him relief, eased his mind for a little bit only gave him sore muscles and made him even more restless. It elevated his heartbeat and made the nervous thoughts run faster through his brain and all it succeeded in doing was give him sore calves in the morning.

Running gave him even more time to think about the lake weekend and everything that had happened, the things that Jensen said. He tried not to think about it, rather focused on teaching and not everything that transpired. He had heard rumors that Jensen might swing for both teams but it was nothing more than just rumors. He was currently dating Danni. There would be no way that Jensen would just give her away for him, even after everything he said.

But then again, after the lake weekend, he wasn’t sure anymore. Hell, he wasn’t even sure what they were anymore. It should have been easy to pin down, to name but he didn’t know. They were friends and as far as Jared knew, they still were but it felt like there was something more. Something just swimming under the surface waiting to boil over and just happen.

By the time he got back to the house, the dogs were exhausted. Jared took off the leashes and harness and both dogs immediately plopped down on their spot in the living room. They were both asleep in seconds.

The coffee had already finished brewing and he fixed it the way he liked it, sweet as sin and he color of toffee. It hardly tasted like anything when he drank it. He stripped out of his shirt, wiping the cooling sweat from his face and body before deciding to go ahead and hop into the shower. He tried not to think of anything as he methodically washed his body, washed his hair. Small correction, he tried not to think about Jensen as he stood underneath the hot spray of water. However, the sneak bastard he was, Jensen seemed to creep up into the forefront of his mind and decided to just stay there.

He wondered if Jensen had noticed the change between the two of them as well. If he could sense that things weren’t as they once were. Jensen was one of the most perceptive people that Jared had ever met so surely he knew that there was something different but then again he’s made no inclination that he remembered anything that happened over the weekend. Relatively speaking, things had seemed to be normal even minus that unspoken shift and surely if Jensen actually remembered what had happened then they would be able to get over whatever this was.

But maybe it was a good thing that Jensen didn’t remember what happened, what he said, what he declared. In the grand scheme of things, it honestly probably would not have worked out between the two of them. Jensen was everything. He was an amazing teacher, hilarious, ridiculously charismatic and not to mention absolutely gorgeous. 

Jared was just Jared. There was no way that Jensen would ever settle for someone like him. Jared was just going to have to accept that and keep the thoughts of ‘what if’ locked away and stored tight.

Still, the things that he wanted and actuality didn’t always line up. He needed to stop thinking about Jensen so his mind decided to just kick it up a notch and imagine everything that Jensen was doing right now.

He was probably just now waking up being that he probably didn’t have anything to grade. He always made sure to get all his grading done before the weekend so he wouldn’t have to worry about it at all during the weekend. And as much of an early bird he was during the regular work week, he was a late riser on the weekends. His pot of coffee was probably already brewing being that he finally coughed up the money to get one of those automatic, pre-set coffee makers that would automatically brew at a certain time.

While the coffee was brewing, he was probably headed to the shower, stepping out of his threadbare shirt and sweatpants and into his huge shower.

Body stripped bare and naked, he would step under the hot, nearly scalding water as he prepared for the day ahead of him. The water running down his body, running down the plane of his chest, over his stomach, his waist, over the strong muscles of his thighs. Jared could almost imagine the way that Jensen looked, eyes closed and head tilted forward.

Before he could really think about what he was doing, Jared wrapped his hand around the base of his cock, not really doing anything more than just touch himself as he got hard to the thought of his friend.

Most of the time, he tried not to think of his co-worker whenever he did this. It was just easier that way, easier to hide the fact that there was something more than just a friendship blooming in his head but this time, he couldn’t stop himself.

Jensen was there at the forefront of his mind and he stayed there, unwilling to budge away.

In almost no time at all, Jared came in the palm of his hand and it would have been embarrassing that he came so quickly if he admitted that it was because he was thinking about a pair of bowlegs and freckles. So instead, he wouldn’t admit it was because of that. Instead he wrote it off as it had been a while since he had some time to himself and the water was hot and it felt good.

It would probably have felt even better if it was Jensen’s mouth on him.

He got out of the shower a little shaky and just as uneasy as he was before he got into the shower.

The dogs were still asleep by the time he got back to the kitchen. The coffee still didn’t taste like anything as he finished his cup off. He only recognized the warmth of it as he swallowed it.

Jensen probably would have moaned obscenely around that first sip of coffee. Jared’s heard it enough every morning while they were waiting for the day to begin. And Jared was sure the only reason why Jensen did it was because it would make Jared blush like a virgin school girl even despite the fact that his mind was the one making the dirty connotation. Jensen was a bit of a jackass like that. He liked making Jared squirm.

The day passed slowly, antagonizing slow it seemed. He waiting until it was a socially acceptable hour to go to the liquor store. No matter what anyone said, he wasn’t about to go buy a case of beer at ten in the morning.

He planned on only getting a case of Shiner but right as he was walking up to the register, he walked past a display of Jack that the store had put on sale and almost on impulse, he grabbed the liter that was almost dirt cheap.

Surely Jensen wouldn’t mind a little extra alcohol.

And it wasn’t like Jared was trying to get him drunk again. No, it was just that maybe if Jensen was a little tipsy then maybe he could finally get this whole thing that settled between the two of them gone and away with.

When Jared got back to the house, he sat up in the front of his car, staring at the house. It wasn’t that he hated the place. It was his first house that he bought with his own money. It was his in every sense of the word but it wasn’t the kind of place that he wanted to bring anyone to.

Correction, it wasn’t the kind of place that he wanted to bring Jensen to.

Yeah, it was the kind of place that he would have no problem of bring his friends to because they would all be jealous. While they were sharing an apartment with noisy roommates, he actually had a house. Even despite the fact that the front porch was nearly falling in. The paint was all faded and chipped in more places than not. The inside was not much better. The cabinets were about forty years old and about ready to fall apart. The tile was cracked and broken in several places. The furniture came with the house and they all had questionable stains on them. All the dining ware were mixed-matched, along with the sheets. There were hardly any decorations up on the walls.

The only thing that Jared would have been proud to show off would be the huge 72 inch flat screen tv that was great to watch any kind of game on.

The place seemed too… immature. Especially after being at Jensen’s. His house was perfect, in pristine condition. His grandparents passed it down to him and after he did some major renovations on it, it was just how he wanted.

Jared grabbed the bag with the beer and whiskey and made it up in his mind that he was going to fix up the house, make it a place that he would be proud to invite anyone to.

It might have been a little ridiculous to want to all the sudden fix the house because he was embarrassed to bring a single person to but Jared needed something to keep busy and he always was good with his hands. It had been a while since he was able to fix something, build something and when he first bought the house, he did buy it with the intention to update it.

Jared didn’t have a ton of stuff. Living in a tiny dorm room and then moving into a just as small apartment meant that Jared couldn’t keep a ton of stuff around and even after living in this small house for about a year, he still didn’t have a ton of things laying around. Which made it really easy to tidy things up and move things around so that he could start remodeling.

Then he swept each room, piling up all the dog hair and dust bunnies into a pile before sweeping it up into a dustpan and threw it away.

Paint was going to be the first thing he tackled. The living room was a hideous shade of olive green that was probably popular back in the nineties and it did not stand up to the test of time. He knew that he wouldn’t have enough time to paint the whole house before the game Sunday, so he decided that he would wait until some other weekend. Besides, whenever he thought of paint, he thought of Jensen and the painting of the classroom and that first weekend they spent together and how Jensen completely ruined his life after that. There was nothing that Jared could think of that didn’t make him think of Jensen.

So instead he just cleaned. He cleaned the microwave and the fridge and the oven. The amount of grime that came off the appliances, from inside the appliances had Jared’s skin crawling and he couldn’t believe that he hadn’t thought to clean any of it before now. Just to think that he’s actually cooked things in there with the filth had him wanting to take another shower.

Once he cleaned the kitchen, he plopped down on the couch and flipped on the TV, not even really paying attention to what was playing but rather looking for the background noise.

Before he knew it, his bones seeped into the couch and he fell off into a restless sleep, his thoughts drifting off to Jensen and him standing in Jared’s living room, paint splattered and happy.

It was a little after midnight when he finally woke back up, back stiff from sleeping upright and neck hurting from being bent to where his chin was rest on his chest. The dogs were resting quietly at his feet on the floor and the TV was still playing. He watched the images flash across the screen, not taking in what he was seeing before he finally just shut it off. The dogs woke up and climbed to their feet, looking at Jared, probably waiting to follow him into his room and actually sleep on their bed as opposed to the hardwood floor.

“Yeah yeah.” He said softly, petting each of their heads as he climbed to his feet. “I know. Sleeping on a couch isn’t too fun. Come on.” He muttered, blindly stumbling towards his bedroom in the dark.

Sleep came almost immediately as his head hit the pillow and even as he drifted off to sleep, he couldn’t shake the feeling deep within his gut that something was going to happen during the game, something between him and Jensen that he wasn’t ever going to be able to take back. It just lingered in the back of his mind as he drifted off, one that he wasn’t really thinking about but was there nonetheless and something that he couldn’t get rid off.

The sun was coming in through the blinds when he woke in the morning and he yawned as he stretched, working the strange sense of worry out of his body.

It felt like the afterthought of a nightmare, one that he couldn’t remember but he knew that he had by the way that his muscles were tense and brain wouldn’t settle but when he thought of it, nothing came to mind.

So instead on dwelling about the fact that something didn’t feel right to him, he climbed out of bed and grabbed the leashes once again for the dogs. They were just as happy about it as they were the other day, jumped on him and over each other to be the first one out the door.

It helped put a smile on Jared’s face and by the time he was about a mile from his house, the nerves had worked its way out of his system and he felt at ease. The sun was out and it was shining and it was a beautiful day and he was going to be able to hang out with Jensen all afternoon, there was nothing else that he could ask for.

He got back to the house and took another quick shower, setting the coffee pot to brew before he jumped in.

It was a quick shower, one that did nothing more than wash away the sweat from his body and the grime out of his hair. The dogs were right at his feet as he wrapped the towel around his waist and shook out his hair, letting it drip dry. The coffee was good as he sat down in front of the TV and flipped it over to the news. The cute little blonde who read off the weather forecast said that it was going to be a nice day out, perfect for a day of grilling out for the game. She sounded hopeful that maybe the Cowboys would pull out a win but Jared knew better than to get his hopes up. They were going to lose.

But at least he was going to spend the evening with Jensen. That’s what the Cowboys had going for them and Jared didn’t care if they won or lost.

It was closer to noon by the time that he managed to pick up his phone from the nightstand where it had been charging all night and he was surprised to see that he had no other notifications other than a text from Jensen. A couple of text in fact.

The first one was asking if Jared wasn’t busy if he wanted to come over a little early.

And then another follow up text that was sent minutes later saying that Jared didn’t have to come over early if he didn’t want to. He could come over right before the game. There was no pressure, it was just… Jensen never did finish the text completely and Jared wouldn’t let him mind finish it for him.

Regardless though, Jared sent a text back saying that he would be more than happy to come over early.

Jensen immediately replied with a smiley face.

Jared dressed as quickly as he could, sticking the dogs outside and grabbing the alcohol that he had bought the day before before he ran out to the car, driving over straight to Jensen’s house feeling just as anxious about this thing that was in the air that didn’t feel right but still too happy to care.

He knocked once, twice on the wooden door before it swung open and revealed Jensen wearing a threadbare shirt and a pair of soft looking sweatpants.

“I come bearing gifts.” Jared said with a smile, holding up the Jack and the beer and Jensen whistled through his teeth.

“Yes, you did.” Jensen took it from Jared, looking at the huge bottle of Jack before turning his gaze back to Jared. “You are a godsend. Lord knows that we’ll need this by the end of the night. Who knows what kind of shit Romo is going to pull.”

Jared laughed as he was lead inside. “You do realize that we aren’t going to win, right?”

“Not with that attitude, we won’t. Optimism is what you need tonight. Who knows what might happen.”

With that, they sat down on the couch and watched some of the pregame interviews until it was late enough that they could start drinking.

It started out with a couple of beers. Jensen cracked one open as he prepared the burgers, mixing up the meat and the spices and such. Jared followed him out to the grill and watched how at ease Jensen looked. He looked right at home, like he was made to do just this.

“You know, I ain’t gonna lie, I do like a man who knows how to handle his meat.” Jared said around a cheeky smile.

Jensen glanced over his shoulder and shot Jared a smile that had Jared’s blood boiling in his body.

“You know how to handle yours?” He asked back, that fucking smirk plastered on his face.

“Of course.”

“I’d like to see that one day.” And with that, Jensen returned to flipping the burgers, making sure that they were grilled all the way through without pressing down on them to loose all the juice.

Jared’s mouth was watering by the time they were done and the Cowboys still didn’t play for another half an hour.

They still made up their burgers, cracked open another beer and plopped down on the couch, ready to watch whatever crap they were about to see unfold on the TV screen. By the time that the game actually started, they had finished off the six pack and started on the one that Jensen had stored in his fridge.

It took no more than seven minutes of the game for the both of them to realize that drinking some beer wasn’t going to cut it. They were going to need something much much stronger to get through the night.

They drank whenever Tony Romo made a stupid ass call and they lost yards. They drank when the referees made a stupid as call that resulted in them losing yards. They drank whenever the Cowboys actually got a first down. They shot back triples whenever the Cowboys managed to score a touchdown.

By the end of the second quarter it was safe to say that they were both plastered but Jensen had enough sense to get them both water, to help a little with the rest of the alcohol that they were most certainly going to drink. Jared followed Jensen into the kitchen, rather stumbled after them and they were both in a fit of giggles by the time they actually poured a glass of water.

The third quarter the game didn’t get much better, the calls from Romo seemed to keep getting worse and the calls from the refs seemed to get even more unfair which meant that they kept shooting back shot after shot, the primary goal to just get drunk.

At the beginning of the evening, Jared was on one side of the couch, a respectable distance away from Jensen but somehow he worked himself closer and closer toward the man until they were nearly on top of each other on the couch and neither one of them made a move to get away. Besides, the Jack was on the table right next to Jensen and Jared only moved closer to him to get closer to the Jack. That’s all he told himself. The lie that he fed himself.

It wasn’t because he liked the way that Jensen felt pressed up against his side or the way that Jensen’s breath would feel whenever he would turn and look at Jared. He was certain that Jensen was watching him now more than the game.

“How’d you know that you’d like guys?” Jensen asked all of the sudden. The Cowboys got a false start, a penalty but neither one of them made a move to take another drink.

Jensen’s voice should have felt loud in his head, being that his mouth was right there next to Jared’s ear but it was soft, quiet. He almost could feel the way that Jensen’s mouth moved against his ear and it made chills run up Jared’s spine.

“Um…” Jared swallowed thickly, his tongue like cotton in his mouth. “I don’t know. I just… it was something I always felt I guess. Girls were nice but in high school there was this guy and we were smoking some pot one night and one thing lead to another. We kissed. It was good. I liked it and I just kinda knew.” Jared paused, his drunk mind not finding it odd or strange that Jensen was asking that. It was just another question that came from his friend. “Why?”

Jensen shrugged. His shoulder bumping against Jared’s.

“Dunno.” They were quiet for several moments.

Then all of the sudden Jensen turned and grabbed Jared by his face and pulled him in for a kiss. It was off kilter, Jensen catching more the side of Jared’s mouth than his lips. Messy and chaste and Jared was frozen, unsure of what to do.

After all this time, here they were sitting on the couch, listening to the Cowboy lose and everything Jared ever wanted was starting to come true. Jensen was kissing him and even though Jensen tasted more of whiskey than anything else but Jared didn’t care. Jensen was kissing him.

That’s all he could think about.

Jensen pulled away, his hand hovering over Jensen’s cheek like he was afraid to touch and he just started at Jared.

Then he was kissing Jared again, this time turning his body to where to could get to Jared’s mouth properly and kiss him like he truly wanted to. Jared leaned into the touch, into the kiss, kissing him back just as hard as Jensen was kissing him and Jared didn’t want anything else in the world.

He could see this happening in the future. The two of them, on the couch, watching the game, complaining, drinking and eating burgers. Making out when it was clear that there wasn’t much of a game left to watch. They would teacher together, kiss in the Jensen’s office, be the talk of the halls.

Then, just as sudden as those thoughts came, the image of Danneel popped into his mind. Her smiling face. The way that Jensen and her looked when they were together. A couple. Happy. The kind to get married and settle down and have kids.

Jared couldn’t do that, couldn’t offer that and it was like something squeezed his heart. Tight to the point that all the blood was pumped out.

Jared pushed away, suddenly sober and rushed to his feet, his chest rising and falling as it chased after a breath.

“What are you… what are you doing, Jensen?” Jared asked, watching as Jensen looked at him with wide, fearful eyes.

“Wh… what do you mean?” Jensen asked. “I… you said… I thought that… after all this time…” He was making no sense which meant that Jensen didn’t know what he was doing, too drunk to be making any kind of decision. But he climbed to his feet anyways, climbing after Jared, reaching out for him like he was going in for another kiss.

“Jensen?” Jared asked carefully, holding out a hand as if to fend Jensen off. “Hey, man, stop, alright. You… you don’t want this.”

“Don’t need you telling me what I want, Jared. I fucking know. And I fucking know that I want you.” Jensen slurred, taking another step forward and Jared’s hand was now in the middle of his chest. And Jared knew that he was too drunk to be dealing with this right now, to fend off what Jensen was offering.

Jensen closed his hand around Jared’s, peeling it from his chest and brought Jared’s fingertips to his lips, kissing each and every last pad before he took another step forward. Jared jumped back like he had been shocked.

“Jensen…” But his name died on Jared’s tongue when Jensen closed the distance, wrapping his hand around the back of Jared’s neck and pulled him down for another kiss, one that was softer and had Jared’s toes curling in his shoes.

Jared couldn’t find it in himself to pull away anymore so he just gave in. He sunk into Jensen’s hold and kissed Jensen.

It felt as if all the time in the world had passed and no time had passed at all. The game had died down in the background to where it was no longer present and yeah, Jared didn’t care anymore. Jensen might be with Danni but he was here with him now and Jared tried to be the better man but he wasn’t. He was a mortal, made of flesh and blood and he had his wants and desires and he desired Jensen. With every ounce of his body.

And that was why it felt as if the rug had been ripped out from underneath him when Jensen pulled away with a sudden gasp.

“I can’t…” Jensen was shaking his head. “Jared, I can’t do this to you. Fuck.” He rubbed his bottom lip and Jared wanted to do nothing more than to grab it between his teeth and kiss Jensen again. “I didn’t mean to do this to you. Fuck. I mean, I’m with Danneel, man. You know that. I shouldn’t have… I’m happy with her. We’re happy. I mean, I’m gonna propose to her. Already have the ring and everything. Fuck. I don’t know what the hell I was doing, kissing you.”

Jared stood there, watching as Jensen rubbed at his forehead, whatever thoughts running through his head that Jared couldn’t read.

So Jared nodded his head, dumbly and took a step back.

“Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.” He muttered, already backtracking towards the front door. He needed to get out of here. “Yeah. The school… It probably wouldn’t be good anyway. With us being co-workers and all. Might take away from the kids or something like that. Yeah… you’re right.”

Before Jensen could say anything else, Jared turned on his heels and walked out the front door, not letting the tears that were burning behind his eyes fall until he got in the car and was headed towards the only place he could think to go.

The bar.

Jared was breathless by the time that he walked into the bar, heart being through his chest that he was certain that it was either going to explode through his ribcage or just give out all together. He honestly didn’t care about which one would happen. It would just give him the escape that he needed. The sweet relief of oblivion so he wouldn’t have to keep replaying what just happened.

Everything that just happened.

Ryan caught his eye as Jared made his way to the end of the bar, nodding his head just a bit telling Jared that he would be with him in a moment.

Jared couldn’t even find it in him to shoot back a smile signaling that Jared acknowledged him in anyway.

Jensen had kissed him. Jensen had kissed him, not once but twice and then Jared had to fucking pull away because he…

He didn’t even know the reason why.

But the thing is, Jensen kissed him and it was everything and nothing like Jared would think it would be. There weren’t the fireworks and all the stars didn’t align in perfect formation telling them that they were meant to be together. Shit like that didn’t happen in real life. Instead, it felt comfortable, familiar. It felt like a place that he was just waiting to come home to and Jared never wanted to leave.

He dropped his head down on the bar and let out an anguished cry.

A moment later, there was a thud by his head and Jared looked up through his bangs, looking at Ryan in front of him, a drink right next to him. Like Jared needed anymore alcohol for the night.

“You looked like you needed it.” Ryan shrugged, pushing it towards Jared.

He just looked at it and shook his head.

“Trust me, that’s the last thing I need right now.” Jared muttered, his words still slightly slurring together. Yeah, the last thing he needed was another drink. There was no telling what he might do with another couple in him, like drive all the way back to Jensen and grab him by his stupid face and kiss him until he sucked all the oxygen out of his lungs.

Ryan didn’t take the drink back, leaving it right where he was and rested against the bar on his forearms. He just stood there and waited.

“He fucking kissed me.” Jared said after a while, deciding to take the drink anyway. Maybe Ryan would have enough sense to keep him here if Jared headed for the door. “He fucking kissed me and I kissed him back.”

“Well, that’s what you wanted, right?” Ryan asked, tilting his head to keep Jared’s gaze.

“I pushed him away!” Jared exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air. A couple of the patrons glanced his way, scowling just ever so slightly at his outburst. Jared didn’t care. They could go fuck themselves for all he cared. They weren’t dealing with the fact that the fucking man of his dreams kissed him and Jared could do nothing more than just push him away. “He has a girlfriend and he kissed me and… I need another drink, man.”

Ryan took the little tumbler away and returned with a glass of water. Jared didn’t say anything about the non-alcoholic drink and drank it in a single go, gulping it down until it was all gone.

“You wanna tell me why you pushed him away?”

Jared rolled his eyes. “Because he has a girlfriend and I’ve told you, she’s perfect. I can’t do that shit to her. I mean… I guess… he had been drinking and he had a lot… well, I guess that I had a lot too but still. He had a lot and we were sitting close and I don’t know, maybe he gets really fucking horny when he gets trashed and I was the nearest thing next to him and he just grabbed me. He was… He was just con…”

“I’m gonna stop you right there, Jared. If you say that he was confused, I am kicking you out of this bar. That is the one thing that he’s not. He’s not confused.”

“But he kissed me when… when he’s in a very committed relationship with a girl.”

“Okay.” Ryan drawled. “Let me ask you this, do you think that he was just experimenting with you because he was getting bored with his current relationship?”

“No.” Jared shook his head again, harder this time. “When he talks about her, it’s clear that he loves her. There’s no way that he was  _ experimenting  _ with me. I mean, he’s never even said anything about wanting to be with a guy. It’s always been girls.”

“Then, Jared, you have to just go ahead and accept the fact that it might just be what you wanted.” Ryan paused, as if waiting to see if Jared would finish the thought for him. Jared wasn’t going to. “He might actually be into you.”

Jared scoffed. Then he started to laugh, crude and humorless because of course the universe would fuck with him like this. “There’s no way.”

“Dude, yes. It’s a very real possibility. I mean, everything that you’ve told me, it seems like he is. No straight man that I know, who has a beautiful girlfriend, climbs into bed with me at a lake house as opposed to going to sleep with their girlfriend. No straight man that I know, texts me as much as he does. No straight man that I know…”

“Alright!” Jared cut him off. “Alright. Just stop. Please. I don’t… I don’t need to hear this right now.”

“Why? Because it’s the truth? Because you might call him and go back to his house and kiss him again and this time  _ not _ push him away because you know that what I’m telling you is the truth?” Ryan pushed.

“No.” Jared muttered, exhausted now. “You don’t understand, Ryan. All his life, he’s been with girls. He’s been with Danni for nearly a decade, I can’t… I can’t just ask him to throw all that away on a whim that he might be into me. It would ruin him.”

“You don’t know that.”

Jared slumped back against the bar and pinched the bridge of his nose. “What?”

“He’s only told you what he’s wanted to tell you. He’s told you that he’s very happy with his girlfriend because maybe he is trying to convince himself of that. He hasn’t told you that he might be into guys because maybe he’s protecting himself from the idea that maybe  _ you  _ might not be into him. You’ve ever thought of that? You only know the things that he’s told you. Anything else, that’s you speculating.” 

“Ryan…” Jared whined, more liked begged, for silence, for not this.

“But hey…” Ryan threw his hands up in the air. “What do I know. I’m just the gay bartender who pours you free drinks and listen to your dumbass pine after another man.” It should have sounded bitter but Ryan just sounded indifferent. “You want my opinion, go back to his house. Knock on his door. Grab him and kiss him like you mean it. And if you don’t want to do that, then go home, Jared. Sleep. But don’t fuck up your chance at happiness because you’re trying to decide the happiness for two people. Be selfish this one time. Take what you want and don’t look back.”

Ryan clasped his hand over Jared’s resting on the bar. Jared was certain he was close to tears now.

“If at the end of the week and you still decide you don’t want him, you know where I’ll be. I’ll pour you a good strong drink. Just don’t… don’t make the wrong decision here.”

And with that, Ryan pulled away and worked his way back down the bar, helping the other customers who flagged him down. Jared sat there for a long while, tracing the grain on the bar, trying to decide what he was going to do. At one point, he pulled out his phone and went as far to pull up Jensen’s number, his thumb hovering over the call button but ultimately his cowardliness won out and he shoved his phone back into his pocket.

He couldn’t do this to Danneel and he most certainly couldn’t do this to Jensen. He had this perfect life lined out in front of him and Jared wasn’t just going to let Jensen throw it all away. No matter how much he wanted to.

So Jared made the wrong decision. Instead of driving to Jensen’s house and telling Jensen everything, he went back to his own house and fell asleep in his very own cold bed, wishing that things had turned out differently.

That he wasn’t a fucking coward.

The very next day, Jensen proposed to Danneel over burnt oatmeal, sporting a massive hangover and the taste of Jared still on his lips. 

Naturally she said yes.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If comments be the food of writing, comment on.


	5. Chapter 5

Things got worse, if that was even possible. Jared tired, lord knows he tired, to keep things good between the two of them. The next day, Jensen wasn’t in the parking lot with coffee but that was okay, they needed a few more hours to collect themselves. So at lunch, Jared showed up at his office, an extra portion of lasagna in his bag as some sort of half assed apology and Danneel was there, practically sitting in Jensen’s lap.

There on her right hand, was the diamond of a very real engagement ring and Jared’s heart stopped right there in his chest.

He wanted to think that he made the right choice, that he called this whole thing right. Jensen had been planning on proposing to her for a while, he had the ring picked out almost a year ago, he was just waiting for the right moment to do it. Maybe, as much as he hated to think it, last night was just what Jensen needed to go ahead and tie the knot with her. The scare that he needed to propose to her.

Nothing like a great big gay crush to push you towards marrying the girl you’ve been dating for almost a decade.

Jared wasn’t able to pinpoint the exact moment that they stopped hanging out with each other, but there was one day where Jared saw Jensen and then there was a day when they didn’t cross paths. They had no reason to.

The midnight texts stopped. The parking spot that Jensen had saved for Jared everyday right next to his car was always taken. No longer did he have a friend to eat lunch with. Instead, he filled his room with students who wanted to stay behind and work, although that quickly changed to students who just wanted to stay in his room to socialize with each other.

He didn’t have the heart anymore to tell them that he just wanted to be alone.

The real dagger to the heart was during lunch one day, one of the little groups that liked to stay in his room for lunch were talking and somehow they fell on the topic of Jensen. It was through them that he found out that the date for the wedding was already set and it was the week after school got out.

So fucking quick. But why wait when you’ve been together for so long?

He held it together for long enough for the kids to disappear to their third period class before he shut the door and locked it, collapsing on the floor with his heart in his hands.

They had been friends, told each other almost everything and now Jared had to find out that Danneel and him were getting married at the end of the year by overhearing it from his students. Jensen didn’t think to tell him, didn’t  _ want _ to tell him.

They were once so wrapped up in each other that time had no meaning and now Jared wasn’t even a second thought.

He barely had enough time to compose himself for his final period and he damn near beat the kids out the door.

That night he cried in Ryan’s shoulder as Ryan fucked into him, not stopping because Jared kept begging for Ryan to just make him forget about Jensen. He wrapped his legs tight around Ryan’s waist and wouldn’t unclasp them until he was shaking from exhaustion.

Ryan was too good to him and before long Jared stopped seeing him too. It wasn’t fair to Ryan for Jared to keep showing up when he was upset and just wanted to be fucked for a little while. Ryan might said that it was nothing more than a friends with benefits kind of thing but Jared wasn’t stupid. He saw the way that Ryan lit up whenever Jared walked into the bar, smiled whenever Jared talked about something other than Jensen and the things that never did happen. Ryan was developing some sort of feelings and Jared couldn’t keep stringing him along like that. So he just stopped.

At first, Ryan texted him, asking him where he was and after the one word answers that Jared would reply with, he finally just stopped texting and Jared felt even worse than he did before.

So the only thing that he could do was start looking for jobs elsewhere, a different town, a different city. Hell, if he could afford it, a different state. He would retake the test, get certified in that state, anything to get away from this school and the siren that walked these halls who didn’t want his heart.

He loved it here and it killed him to start putting in applications elsewhere but he couldn’t do this next year, knowing that Jensen would be  _ married _ . There was no telling what a summer would do to them. Maybe things would be mended, after their honeymoon, maybe they would go back to being friends and Jared knew that if they went back to being just friends, he was most certainly going to go crazy.

He had to get out. He had to get away and whenever he actually got called in for an interview, the first thing that he wanted to do was text Jensen to share the good news but right around the moment that he would unlock his phone, he would remember that it was all because of Jensen that he was looking for a new job in the first place. It was all he could do not to throw his phone across the room and smash it into a million pieces.

He found himself staying later and later into the evening. First it was to stay after school to help with tutoring. He always volunteered and never complained and the other english teachers were in no hurry to try and argue with Jared about staying late. They were all ready to get on out of school, back home and away from children.

Then it turned into, once tutoring was over, he went back to his room and worked there for a little while longer until the custodians were ready to leave and Jared begrudgingly followed after them. Finally, after a couple of weeks of the custodians chasing Jared out of the building, then all decided to give Jared a copy of the master key and told him that he could stay however late he wanted, just exit out of the side door and make sure that he looks the door back after him.

Jared did, every night.

There were three months remaining in the school year and it was getting closer and closer to the AP exams and Jared really started to buckle down and start testing the kids to make sure that they knew the content.

Almost once a week, they either took a released copy of the multiple choice tests or they wrote essays and Jared heard the way that the kids were talking about him in the hallways. That he was drilling them down, gave out tons of homework. Class was no longer fun. Jared was always in a bad mood, short with everyone.

An atmosphere that was once infectious with laughter died to the point that no one talked anymore. The kids came to class, sat down, did their work and then left.

It was getting close to nine and Jared hadn’t eaten anything that day, not hungry as it was. The custodians had already left, ready to get a jumpstart on their weekend but Jared was in no hurry to go anywhere. It was quiet at his house. It was quiet here. There was no need to go anywhere.

But he knew that he needed to leave. His eyes were starting to hurt, headache blooming right behind them from staring at paper all day. He knew that he needed to get something to eat and he didn’t have anything in his classroom which meant that he was going to have to head home.

Slowly, he packed up everything that he would need for the weekend, in no hurry to get anywhere.

It was dark when he stepped outside and the area around the side door that he left through was always poorly lit. There were several streetlights that had gone out and despite the fact that Jared wrote to the city to get them fixed, they still hadn’t been touched.

Jared wasn’t worried about it though. The first few times he left alone after dark, the story that Jensen told him about unsuspecting teachers and people getting mugged in the night played through his mind but after several weeks of nothing happening, Jared stopped worrying about it. Not that it didn’t happen. A few streets over there were a couple of muggings. A few people got roughed up but that was it.

Besides, Jared was tall. Most of the time people didn’t want to mess with him and when they did, Jared was always able to hold his own. It was just one of the things that he learned growing up in Texas.

So, against Jensen’s best wishes, he started leaving alone, in the dark, completely unprotected.

And maybe that’s why he wasn’t expecting the baseball bat that hit him on the back of the head that had him collapsing to the ground in an instant. His vision blurred and he saw stars and didn’t even feel the first kick to his ribs. Nor the second. It took a while for his body to catch up to what had happened and by that point it was too late. He was already on the ground, cowering while a couple of guys alternated between kicking him and hitting him with the bat. Then, when it was clear that Jared wasn’t going to fight back, they started rummaging through his pockets, looking for his wallet, phone, money anything.

Jared groaned, made an attempt to fight back but his head was spinning. It was pounding, like his skull was cracked open and around the edges of his vision, things were going black.

There was a shout, somewhere off in the distance, or it felt distance to Jared. Blood was rushing past his ears, making it hard to hear much of anything and he just curled into a tight ball. He hoped that all of this would just end quickly. He would let them take whatever they wanted, he just wanted to world to stop spinning and the pounding behind his head to cease.

He wasn’t sure if he passed out or not but he flinched when there was a soft hand that touched the side of his face, seeming to cradle his head and Jared opened his eyes.

His eyelashes were clumped together with blood and he whimpered when the hand pushed the hair away from his forehead.

“Hey, man. Jared, it’s me.” Jared blinked, trying to put a name to the voice. He couldn’t see anything, not through the darkness and not through the blood. “It’s me. Jensen. Hey, stay with me, man. Come on.”

Jared just shook his head, a barely there movement because that couldn’t be the case. There was no way that this man that was touching his face, crouching down next to him was Jensen because it was late and it was a Friday and he has a soon to be wife to go home to and there would be no reason for Jensen to still be here. So this, the voice, the touch, it was nothing more than a would be memory brought on by a baseball bat to the back of the head.

“Nope, nope, nope, nope. You’re not giving out on me, Padalecki.” Jensen groaned, patting his face a couple of times. “Come on, man, wake up. Don’t go to sleep on me. We need… we need to get you to a hospital.”

Jared opened his eyes again and this time, the person, Jensen wiped the blood from his eyes and Jensen was really there. He really was by some crazy miracle.

“What are you…” He coughed, tasting blood on the back of his tongue. “What are you doing here?”

“Saving your dumbass apparently.” Jensen replied, grabbing Jared’s arm and tried to pull him up to his feet. “Come on. You’re gonna have to help me out here a little bit. Can’t carry your fat ass all the way to the car all by myself.”

Jared just groaned and pushed at Jensen. “You didn’t answer me. Why are you here? School?”

“Jared, can we please not right now. We need to get you to a medical doctor. You took a pretty hard hit to the head. Bleeding all over the place.”

“I’m not…” Jared’s eyes started to close and he could feel himself start to drift off when Jensen patted his cheek again. Jared opened his eyes half way, seeming the blurry outline of Jensen. “I’m not goin’ nowhere til you tell me why you’re still here.”

Jensen hand a hand down his face and sighed. “You promise? You’ll get into the car and go to the hospital without fighting me?”

Jared nodded his head and it felt like rocks were rolling around. He made some sort of sound like an agreement.

“Aw, fuck it.” Jensen muttered, more to himself than anything. “You’re probably not going to remember any of this anyway.” He took a deep breath. “Danneel and I had a pretty big fight and I didn’t want to go home just yet. And… I was hoping that you still might be around.”

Jared heard the words but they were all muddled in his brain, not really meaning anything to him.

“And lucky for you too. You would have wound up dead out here if it weren’t for me. What have I told you about walking out here alone? Strength in numbers man. You should know better.” Jensen scolded him but it was clear that Jared wasn’t hearing any of it, at least not comprehending any of it. “Okay, we’ve gotta get you to the doctor.”

“Doctor.” Jared mumbled.

Somehow, Jared climbed to his feet and leaned on Jensen the entire way to the car and then things after that seem to just black out all together.

It was the beeping that woke Jared up and he groaned because he meant to turn off his alarm clock the night before. It was the weekend. He was going to sleep in. In fact, he was planning on sleeping all weekend.

But the more that the beating went off, the less it sounded like  _ his _ alarm clock. The bed didn’t feel like his bed and it was way to hot to be his room.

He woke up in a panic, light flooding his eyes and the pounding in his head just got worse.

A hospital. He was in a hospital and his entire body felt like it had been hit with a bus and the thing that scared him the most was the fact that he couldn’t remember how he’d gotten to the hospital in the first place.

A snore startled him and moving made Jared hurt even more but regardless he looked over to where the sound came from and immediately a lump formed in his throat. Jensen was sitting in the hospital chair that was much to small for him, his head resting on his chest, sleeping in a way that didn’t seem comfortable at all.

The first thought that ran through his head was that he died and somehow he had gotten into heaven and in his heaven he woke up in a hospital bed after being mugged at school because there would be no other reason why Jensen was  _ sleeping _ in that chair. But he didn’t feel like he was dead. He felt very much alive and very much in pain.

So this couldn’t be heaven but it still didn’t answer the question as to why Jensen was there.

Jensen stirred, as if he felt eyes on him and Jared quickly shut his eyes, trying to pretend that he was still asleep. The heart monitor gave him away though, it beating much too fast for his resting heart beat.

“I know that you’re not asleep, Jared.” Jensen mumbled, his voice sounding gruffer than Jared’s heard it.

There was an uneasy rasp to it that had Jared’s stomach twist.

“You’re a fucking jackass, you know that, man.” Jensen sounded tired and he climbed to his feet, walking over to Jared. “You can’t go off and get yourself beat up like that and then fucking pass out in my car. You scared me to death last night, Padalecki.” He paused and Jared was about to say something but Jensen cut him off again. “And what did I fucking tell you about walking outside by yourself? Those guys, they could have been watching you for weeks now, knowing that you leave so fucking late everyday. They knew you were going to be an easy target. After hitting you with a baseball bat. You pull this shit again, I am not saving you, you hear me?”

“Yeah.” Jared replied with as much muster as he could. “You’re not gonna save me again.” It wasn’t like Jared was going to need him to anyway. Not if Jared got the new job he was applying for.

There was an awkward pause and Jensen still didn’t move away from the bed. He hovered, as if he wasn’t sure what to do.

“So… umm…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Just… how much do you remember of last night?”

Jared narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

“No… no, reason. I’m just wondering. The police are going to want to know if you remember seeing the people that beat you up, any description of them. Stuff like that.” He seemed as if he was stuttering through the explantation. “I don’t remember much about them. I was just trying to help you out. I’ve already given my statement to the police.”

Still, that didn’t sit easy with Jared but it seemed reasonable enough. “Oh… uhh, yeah, no. I don’t remember much. I don’t know who attacked me. They came at me from behind and after that everything’s kind of a blur.”

Jensen let out a breath and nodded. “Well, I need to go. The doctor should be in any minute.”

Jensen took a step for the door but Jared reached forward and wrapped his hand around Jensen’s wrist, stopping him.

“Hey.” Jensen looked down at Jared’s hand before looking up at his face. “Where you here alright?”

Jensen shrugged it off like it was no big deal. “Yeah.”

“Thank you.” He said. Completely sincere. “For staying here with me. And saving me from those guys. Thank you.”

Jensen’s mouth twitch and he shook his hand out of Jared’s hold. “Yeah. Yeah, it was no problem.”

Then he left and that was the last of Jensen that Jared heard for a while.

The doctor said that luckily it wasn’t too bad. He had a fractured rib and some deep bruising to his stomach. The doctor said that it meant that for the next for days there might be a little bit of blood in his urine. It shouldn’t worry him too much unless it was nothing but blood or it persisted for longer than a week. The rib was going to hurt but it was going to be an easy heal granted that he rest for at least a month. The doctors were worried about his hit to the head but after a couple of x-rays, it going to hurt for a while but it was nothing more than a bad bruise and a knot the size of a small melon.

They released him that evening and when Jared got back to the house, he was hoping that there might be a text from Jensen but there was none.

For whatever reason, that seemed to hurt more than a baseball bat to the back of the head.

Another month passed and while the kids seemed to forgive Jared a little more for being so cruel, their words, he still felt like his classroom was cold. The school that he once felt so welcomed in, he no longer felt like he belonged. Yeah, there was Genevieve that he talked in the mornings but she had her own click within the school and it wasn’t like Jared could just join in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If comments be the food of writing, comment on.


	6. Chapter 6

He woke to the banging on his front door, or at least that’s what he thought it was. It was in the middle of the night and there was no other reason why there would be a banging to wake him up. The dogs were growling ever so slightly and Jared crawled out of bed, told them to stay down and he made his way towards the living room.

The banging still didn’t stop.

He didn’t even think before he whipped the door open, annoyed that someone had the audacity to wake him up like this. He didn’t think about the fact that there could have been some murderer on the other side of the door waiting to kill him. He just threw it open, ready to lay into whoever disturbed his sleep like this.

But he stopped cold.

Jensen looked like hell, simply put.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Jensen?” Jared asked, still annoyed but he softened just a little bit.

“I’m an idiot.” Jensen said, more like slurred and Jared wasn’t going to disagree with that one.

Then, out of nowhere, Jensen just grabbed Jared’s face and pulled him down for a kiss, one that almost hurt but was in every way perfect. “I’m such a fucking idiot.” He whispered against Jared’s lips and Jared was too stunned to do anything other than just stand there and be kissed.

He found his voice somewhere and his strength and he pushed Jensen away.

“What the fuck, Jensen!” Jared yelled, mind spinning. “What are you doing here? Why are you here?”

“I’m… I’m kissing you. I thought that was obvious.” Jensen replied, the most infuriating and cutest look of confusion crossing his face.

“But why? Why are you kissing me?”

“Because I want to.” It was the simplest thing for Jensen to say. “Because I want to be with you. Because I’m tired of being alone and unhappy and wishing that I could just do this. Be with you. So here I am. Bearing my heart and soul and all that shit and asking if you’ll have me. If you’ll let me be happy with you.”

“But you  _ are _ happy, Jensen. With Danneel. You’re in a relationship  _ with _ Danneel. You’re happy with her. You two… you are engaged to her. You’re getting married in like a month. You can’t throw that away. Not on this. Not… on me.”

“You really think that?” Jensen spit, sounding more disgusted with himself than what Jared said. “That I’m happy with Danni. That I wanna get married and have three kids and live in that house up on the hill and grow old with her?” Jensen took a fumbling step forward, shaky and unsure and against his better judgment, Jared reached out, grabbing Jensen by the shoulders to steady him. Jensen leaned into the touch. “Sure she’s fucking perfect. Better than anything I can ever dream of getting but I’m with her because that’s the only thing I know how to do. Because it’s easy and familiar. I can pretend to be the loving boyfriend and that I am crazy in love with her because that’s what I’m good at. Acting. Around everyone, everyone at school, my family, with her, with my friends, I pretend that I’m something I’m not but you. Jared, when I’m with you I don’t have to do that. You… I’m tired of acting. Of pretending that what I want isn’t what I want and what I have is what I need. Please, Jared.”

Jared wasn’t sure what exactly Jensen was asking for, begging for but he knew one thing. He could smell the alcohol on Jensen. It clung to him and there would be no way that Jensen would be here if he was completely sober so that meant what he said wasn’t really the truth. Or rather something that his drunk thoughts managed to convince himself was the truth.

“Jensen, you’re drunk. You need to…” He almost said ‘go home’ but Jensen was in no state to drive again. He shouldn’t have driven over here in the first place.

“I might be drunk but I know what I fucking want.” Jensen said, not even noticing that Jared had trailed off. He even tried to stand up straight, as if that would change the fact that he was wasted. Jared wondering if Jensen had decided to drink an entire liquor store before coming over here. It certainly smelled like it.

Jared just sighed and finally removed his hands from Jensen’s body. He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed again, deeper, trying to collect his thoughts.

“Listen man, it’s three in the morning on a fucking Wednesday. We both have school tomorrow and…”

“I don’t.” Jensen said matter-of-factly.

Jared narrowed his eyes. “What?”

“I’m not going. Not tomorrow. Not next week. Not next year. I’m done with teaching, with all these double standards. I’m done.”

“What the hell are you talking about, man? You love teaching. You can’t just quit.” There was a pause and Jensen blinked slowly as if he didn’t understand what Jared was saying which only amplified the fact that he was wasted and was not in the right state of mind to be making any kind of life altering decisions. “Okay, you are really drunk right now, Jensen. You need to sleep and in the morning you’ll realize how much of a mistake your making.” Jared wrapped his hand around Jensen’s shoulder and tried to pull him inside but Jensen didn’t move. Even drunk off his ass, he was strong.

“I’m not going anywhere until you understand me, Jared.” His words were starting to become more and more slurred, eyes drooping and it wouldn’t be long until he passed out.

And Jared knew he would much rather have Jensen pass out, on his couch, instead of on his front porch because then he wouldn’t have to drag his sorry ass inside.

“I understand you. Okay, I do. I’m just saying that you’re making a mistake throwing everything away like this and right now, you’re too drunk to realize that. What you need to do is drink some water and then sleep.” Jared made up his mind that he was just going to skip school tomorrow too. All to make sure that Jensen stayed away from the bottle and came to his senses.

“No. You don’t understand!” Jensen exclaimed, pushing at Jared hard in the chest. Jared stumbled backwards a couple of steps. “You don’t. You think that I’m making a mistake when I’ve wanted to do this forever. I hate my job, Jared. I hate my life right now. Everything about it. Except for you. If I have to quit my job to make you realize that I want nothing but you, then I will.”

Jared frowned, too tired to play these mind games that Jensen thought would be a great idea to start playing at three in the fucking morning.

“What the hell are you talking about? You’re the one who pushed me away the other night, Jensen. You’re the one that said you didn’t want this. That I was the one who was confused and that you were happy with Danneel. That you were going to fucking propose to her and that this thing between you and me was just for fun. Don’t you remember that?”

Jensen frowned, his brow furrowed like he was actually trying to remember that conversation, everything that he said. “But you said that you were okay with that because it would be better for us anyway, for the job. You said that it wasn’t a good idea for the two of us to date because we were co-workers and that the kids would…”

“I was trying to pretend that I wasn’t hurt that you didn’t want me, you dumbass!” Jared yelled, unable to keep it inside of him. “You really think I give a fuck about what anyone else thinks about me, about us? I don’t. I just said that to pretend that it was a mutual agreement and that it really would be better for us.”

“Oh.” Jensen said, his voice suddenly very small and he looked down at his feet, looking very much like a dejected puppy. “I thought that you… I thought it was because… you never showed any interest in me and I thought…” Jared had no idea what he was going on about, his words making even less sense the more he talked.

“You were really about to quit your job just because you thought that I didn’t want to have this office romance thing going on? That you thought I cared about what people would think?” It sounded ridiculous as Jared repeated it. A cliche in every sense of the word but it was actually happening, unfolding right in front of him.

Jensen stared at Jared for a moment and then he started to laugh. A deep, full sound that came from inside his chest, just working its way out.

“Man, I’m really fucking drunk.” Jensen said with profound realization, as if it was the most serious thought he’s had all night.

“You think?” Jared laughed back, pulling Jensen into a hug.

Jensen just grabbed handfuls of Jared’s shirt and buried his head into the crook of Jared’s shoulder and laid there, breathing him in.

“I’m serious, Jared. I don’t want anything else but you.”

Later, when Jensen wasn’t drunk, they were going to have to have a conversation, a serious conversation about everything. About his leaving Danneel. About him wanting to be with him but right now he needed to get Jensen to bed and he meant that in the most innocent way possible. Jensen needed to sleep and he needed to not make anymore life altering decisions.

“Okay.” Jared finally said, pulling away from the solid warmth against him. “You’re gonna have one hell of a hangover tomorrow. We need to get you to bed, man”

Jensen’s eyes lit up like all of the sudden Jared was propositioning something from him and it seemed like he was going to totally be down with it. And normally, Jared wouldn’t object but it was three in the morning and Jensen was still drunk and while he might say that he wants this now, there really was no telling if he would want it when he was sober. So no matter how much Jared wanted to just experience it once, have the knowledge of what Jensen would sound like, feel like, taste like, he wasn’t about to take away that autonomy from Jensen. He would wait and if Jensen still wanted it in the morning then he wasn’t going to object.

“No. Not like that. Sleep. As in, you close your eyes and work all this alcohol out of your system.” Jared said, ducking underneath Jensen’s arm so that he was practically carrying him as he lead Jensen inside and towards his room.

“Mhmm, sure.” Jensen mumbled as he buried his head in the crook of Jared’s shoulder and took a deep breath before he just collapsed against Jared.

They both almost fell, Jared not expecting to have to carry the full weight of Jensen.

“Come on, man, you gotta walk a little bit here. I can’t carry you all the way.” Jared groaned under the strain of trying to keep them both up right.

Jensen mumbled something incoherent into Jared’s neck and made no effort to actually walk on his own.

He was practically half asleep by the time Jared managed to get him to his room. The bed was big enough for the both of them to share except for the fact that Jared didn’t want to wake up next to a Jensen that was sober and didn’t actually want him. It would be less awkward if that were to happen and he was asleep on the couch.

However, Jensen wasn’t having any of that. As Jared was trying to get him comfortably on the bed, taking his shoes off and pulling the blankets up over him, Jensen wrapped his hand around Jared’s wrist and yanked him down as Jared was trying to leave. There were extra blankets and pillows in the hallway closet. It wouldn’t be the first time that he’s had to sleep on the couch since meeting Jensen.

“Just where the hell do you think you’re going?” Jensen slurred, face half pressed into the pillow, half exposed to the moonlight that was shining in through the window. Jared most certainly did not notice the way that his freckles seemed to pop in the soft lighting.

“I’m going to sleep.” Jared answered plainly, trying to yank his wrist out of Jensen’s grip but Jensen was stronger than he looked at the moment.

“But this is your bed.” He replied back. “Where else would you sleep?”

“The couch.” Still Jensen didn’t let go of his hand.

Instead, he pulled Jared back down, hard enough and fast enough that Jared didn’t have enough time to ground himself before he toppled over, landing awkwardly on top of Jensen. There was a small smile that appeared on his face as he seemed pleased with himself.

“Don’t be stupid, Jared. This is your bed too. And I promise I won’t bite.” There was a pause and then through a very cheeky grin, he said. ”Unless you want me too.”

Jared just rolled his eyes and sighed, pretending to be the disgruntled one as he rolled off of Jensen and settled under the covers. It was like Jensen had become some sort of magnet or something, one that was only attracted to the gravitational pull of Jared and he latched onto him, his mouth landing somewhere below Jared’s ear that seemed to be a direct line to Jared’s dick. He was almost immediately hard, like he was so teenager or something.

“Jensen, stop.” Jared groaned, placing a hand in the middle of Jensen’s chest and pushed his off. “I’m not doing this tonight. You’re really drunk and I don’t…”

“I swear to god if you say some shit like you’re trying to protect my dignity or whatever, I will fucking punch you in the face.” Jensen said, sounding completely serious as he fought against the hand that was keeping him from a safe distance away from Jared.

“Okay, I won’t say that I’m protecting your dignity since you obviously had none in the first place showing up at my place wasted and about to quit your job but I’m not about to have sex with you while you’re still drunk.”

“If you’re worried about taking advantage of me, you’re not.” Jensen purred against Jared’s neck and okay yeah, when Jensen started talking like that and did that with his tongue, how was Jared supposed to say no? “And you don’t hafta do anything. You can just lay there…” Jensen moved, throwing his leg over Jared’s waist and straddled him, rolling his hips ever so slightly and Jared had to bite off the moan that was threatening to come out. “While I do all the work.” Jensen rolled his hips once more. “You know, I can feel how hard you are right now, Padalecki. Just… please.”

It was an enticing offer, one that Jared so desperately wanted to accept but he couldn’t. Not when the possibility of tomorrow meant that Jensen might run back to his girl even after all the declarations he made.

So Jared put his hands on Jensen’s hips and stilled him. “No. I’m not doing anything while you’re still drunk. When you get sober and you still wanna do something, then we’ll talk. But right now you need sleep. And I need sleep and if you try to keep me up any longer, I will make you sleep on the floor.”

He felt like a parent scolding a small child and the way that Jensen pouted made him look like a child. Reluctantly Jensen moved off him and settled back underneath the covers. Still, he didn’t keep his distance. He wrapped his arms and legs around Jared like a damn octopus and within seconds he was asleep, his breath causing goosebumps to rise across Jared’s skin.

Morning came earlier than what Jared would have wanted. His alarm went off at six o’clock sharp and he scurried to turn the damn thing off. Jensen barely stirred, snoring steadily away.

Jared settled back down into the mattress and let himself fall back asleep with the reassuring heat of Jensen next to him and tried not to think about how much it was going to hurt if everything that had just happened was nothing more than the false desires of a drunken haze.

He woke up again an hour later, still tired but too restless to fall back asleep.

Jensen was still asleep, curled into a small ball under the covers, dark circles under his eyes and Jared knew that when he finally did wake up, he was going to have one hell of a hangover. So Jared got up and filled up a glass of water, along with grabbing a couple Aleve for when he finally did wake up.

After he caught himself staring at the man in his bed for a long while and feeling like he was watching something that wasn’t his yet, he went back into his small kitchen and started to cook breakfast. He started the coffee pot, making sure to make the coffee as strong as he could before turning to his nearly empty pantry. There were a couple pieces of bread left which he grabbed to make toast and in the fridge there were a couple of eggs and a few sorry looking pieces of bacon just waiting to be fried up.

He was already trying to figure out what he would say to Jensen when he finally came to, sobered up and realized just how big of a mistake he was making to leave Danneel just to be with him. No one in their right mind would want to leave her.

She was literally everything that someone would want in a girl. Sweet, funny, just a bit quirky, absolutely stunning and Jared was literally none of those things.

Granted, work would be a little awkward but then again, it had been awkward for a while now. Given time, they would get over the awkwardness and maybe they would be friends again and maybe Jared would stop hating himself for not taking Jensen when he had the chance but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he knew that Jensen didn’t really want him and he still took advantage of him when he was in no condition to be making any kind of decisions. 

Jared was never that type of guy.

He was always the one who would hold the girls hair back when she was puking up her alcohol and then get her into bed when there was nothing else to puke up.

Jared flinched nearly through the roof when all the sudden a pair of arms laced around his waist and a pair of lips settled at the knob of his spine.

All the nerves and uneasiness about the future completely disappeared and Jared placed his hands over Jensen’s.

“How yah feeling this morning?” Jared asked, moving to turn the heat to low on the stove. The last thing he wanted to do was burn Jensen’s hangover breakfast.

“Like I got hit by a fucking school bus.” Jensen grumbled in response, his head still buried in the back of Jared’s neck.

“Did you see the Aleve that I left out for you?” Jared tried to keep his voice neutral, let Jensen guide what was going to happen next. So Jared focused on the breakfast in front of him and not the hot line of muscle that was clinging to his back.

“I did. Thank you.” Jensen replied.

“That’s good. Shouldn’t be too long before the medicine starts working.” Jared cleared his throat. “Umm… I’m making you some breakfast too. Eggs and bacon and there’s some coffee brewing that will be done in a minute.”

Jensen groaned and pressed another kiss to the back of Jared’s neck. “That’s not what I want right now, Jay.”

Jared’s heart skipped a beat at the nickname and he wanted to do nothing more than turn around and pin Jensen against the counter and just make out with him. Still, he wouldn’t allow himself to do that, not without the explicit, sober consent.

“Okay, that’s cool.” Jared wouldn’t take his concentration off the bacon in front of him. “I can make you something else. Pretty sure I have some stuff to make pancakes or like, I’m sure I have grits. I could make grit cakes instead or…”

“Will you just shut up and kiss me?” Jensen cut him off.

Jared didn’t even hesitate. He set down the spatula and turned around, grabbing Jensen’s face in between his hands and kissed him; hard and desperate like this would be the last time that he would ever be able to. Jensen kissed back just as desperately. He buried his hands in the front of Jared’s shirt and pulled him as close as he could.

Jared flipped the two of them, pinning Jensen against the counter and Jared could feel just how hard Jensen was.

Then all the sudden Jensen pulled away, mouth open and lips swollen as he gasped for breath before he dropped down to his knees and mouthed at the outline of Jared’s cock through his sweatpants. Jared’s head was spinning, vision peppering with stars.

“Wanted to do this last night, you know.” Jensen said, pulling Jared’s sweatpants down just enough for him to get his cock out.

“I know.” Jared replied completely breathless. He wasn’t going to last long. Not with the perfect image of this disheveled Jensen on his knees in front of him.

“But you were too much of a goddamn gentleman to take advantage of me.” Jared didn’t miss the annoyed and teasing lilt to his voice. “Even when I was fucking begging you.” Jensen had Jared’s cock in his hand, inches from his mouth and with every exhale of his breath, Jared shuddered. “You gonna stop me now?” And the bastard had the audacity to smirk as he asked.

Like Jared was actually in any position to say no now.

“Fuck Jen, stop teasing.”

“I’ll take that as a no.” And before Jared could exclaim in frustration, Jensen closed his mouth around the tip of his cock and Jared did good to just remember to breathe.

It was better than anything that Jared could have ever imagined it would feel. His imagination did nothing to compare to what it actually felt to have Jensen suck him off like this. His mouth was so warm and wet and when Jensen hallowed his cheeks and sucked, it felt like the breath was completely knocked out of him. Again.

“Holy fuck.” Jared muttered, burying his hands into Jensen’s hair and grabbed him, just trying to hold on. “Fuck, your mouth.”

Jared could feel Jensen smirked as he doubled his efforts, hell bent on making Jared come, like Jared was going to have any problem with that in the first place. Jensen wrapped his hand around what he couldn’t reach with his mouth and Jared had to grab the edge of the counter just to stay upwards. Jensen smirked around Jared, humming just a little bit and it sent tremors through Jared’s spine.

It wasn’t too much longer until Jared was coming down Jensen’s throat and Jensen swallowed it all just to show that he was the cocky bastard that would do that.

Jared yanked him up to his feet, grabbing Jensen’s face and kissing him like there was no tomorrow and Jensen kissed him back just as hard.

“We’re gonna have to talk.” Jared said between the kiss.

“Mhmm.”

“About you.”

Another kiss.

“And me.”

Another kiss.

“And why you would throw away the perfect girl for me.”

A pause and Jensen traced Jared’s bottom lip with his thumb before answering.

“I was just waiting to find the perfect person instead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is it, you made it to the end and I applaud you for that. Hopefully this at least once had you cracking a smile at their stupidity and and heart hurt for just a second at how oblivious they were to each other. I hope, maybe, to write more of the lives of these two silly fools, hit on somethings that were missed or could have happened. Like Spring Break next year. What are they going to do together? 
> 
> But with all that being said, I really do hope that you enjoyed it. Thank you so much for reading it.
> 
> And once again, if comments be the food of writing, comment on.

**Author's Note:**

> If comments be the food of writing, then comment on.


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